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Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

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Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#91

Post by Ekaros »

lbriner wrote: post #79

A lot of misunderstanding here about "why would you invest in someone who has failed?" An investor is a gambler. Not just on past success, although I'm sure Marissa has had some successes even if people don't know them. They gamble on: 1) Has this person got the experience (good or bad) to run a business. A failed business leader is a better gamble than someone with no experience. 2) Does this person have a strong ne…

Could there also be 7) Can I sell or offer something to this new company and prop up my other parts of my portfolio?

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#92

Post by frankfrank13 »

i use Sunshine contacts, its pretty nice. I used to have a work phone, my personal phone, and tons of linkedin and Gmail contacts, and I use Sunshine to sync them all to icloud. Works well! Was always super put off by the photos app, but I just never used it.

I like Marissa Mayer, but I'm shocked at how little investment these apps got over the years, despite being the *only* apps they offered. What was this startup lab even doing? For five years!!

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#94

Post by frankfrank13 »

frankfrank13 wrote: post #92

i use Sunshine contacts, its pretty nice. I used to have a work phone, my personal phone, and tons of linkedin and Gmail contacts, and I use Sunshine to sync them all to icloud. Works well! Was always super put off by the photos app, but I just never used it. I like Marissa Mayer, but I'm shocked at how little investment these apps got over the years, despite being the *only* apps they offered. What was this startup…

If anyone has a replacement I am all ears

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#95

Post by moc_was_wronged »

busymom0 wrote: post #48
LeifCarrotson wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The AI would, hands down, write a better sentence if you compared the output quality of an author writing 10,000 words per day with an AI writing 10,000 words per day. Or make the AI write 100,000 words per day, it could write sentences better than that 24/7 without breaking a sweat, while the human would literally be incapable of achieving this goal. But if you gave both a month to write the best 400 word article th…

> But if you gave both a month to write the best 400 word article they could possibly generate on a particular subject, the human author would dominate. What proof is there for this?

[dead]

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#96

Post by antod »

cosmicgadget wrote: post #19
computerphage wrote: post #10

"due to privacy concerns about privacy" This strikes me as a particularly funny typo

Probably wrote "due to concerns about privacy" then realized it should be "due to privacy concerns" and forgot to remove the original bit. Many such cases.

I often do that frequently. I should do it, but forget to not fully proof read after a quick edit. I also regularly leave out n't a lot when changing where a negation happens (see above).

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#97

Post by azinman2 »

freeopinion wrote: post #54
azinman2 wrote: post #23

First a contacts app that bombed, and now an ai assistant? I fear she’s stuck in the past and now is in a beyond crowded space. Have any of her attempts post google worked?

It depends on what you think she is attempting. If you consider that she is attempting to maintain a certain standard of living, then yes, it is working. There is a strange reality where you can get other people to pay you millions of dollars a year because somebody else previously paid you millions of dollars a year. You might have to keep shuffling who pays you, though.

According to the article it’s largely self paid. I’d also be surprised anyone for a pre-product startup is being paid millions a year to run it… even her.

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#98

Post by adastra22 »

collingreen wrote: post #89
adastra22 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If she has any investors with preferences, she probably isn’t seeing a dime.

There are lots of ways to see dimes in these scenarios like signing bonuses or bonuses for closing the funding or selling shares into the new funding. Also she already has more dimes than this failed attempt can bring so it isn't as big of an impact as it would be to someone with nothing.

What does a "a tax thing" mean then?

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#99

Post by watwut »

Keyframe wrote: post #38
ugh123 wrote: post #7

This person has a history of failures venturing on their own.

How she gets any investment going anymore is a great mystery.

Some people get investment money again and again and again and again and all their failures are somehow positive things.

Re: Marissa Mayer will close her old AI startup, sell assets to her new AI startup

#100

Post by mrandish »

eig wrote: post #53
taeric wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ostensibly, it is in what you left out of your question? If you can buy the assets, specifically, you can not buy the liabilities. Obviously, getting some people off of obligation lists is one of them. There could be others?

Is it not illegal in the US to break up a company to isolate liabilities?

It's not specifically against a law but debtors who got shafted can choose to sue the "old" and "new" companies under a few broader laws, basically alleging "I had a valid contract with the old company but this sale is a sham transaction to get out of the contract and 'NewCo' is unjustly enriching themselves by screwing us 'OldCo' debtors." IANAL but my sense is such a case can be won but is far from a slam dunk and it will cost money and take time. Debtors will have to decide if they are out enough money to be worth sinking more money into recovering it. This kind of move might also be an aggressive escalation tactic in a hardball negotiation with debtors unwilling to renegotiate on acceptable terms. It's possible that the OldCo/NewCo people doing this may choose to leave certain assets in OldCo to make legal challenges less likely to prevail than if they'd completely emptied out OldCo.

Other impacts can include future potential NewCo lenders being pretty leery about getting involved with the same people. It's also not a great look for the founder(s)/senior execs in terms of future resume - unless there are extenuating circumstances which justify doing it. An example can be something like a fundamental disagreement between co-founders who are major shareholders. In that scenario this may not be to shaft debtors but rather for the majority co-founders, investors and key employees to 'dump' a minority non-cooperating co-founder who's no longer involved with the company, has a "change of control" veto and won't sell their shares but can't stop an asset sale. Basically the board approves the sale and the key execs/employees all vote with their feet. The original OldCo shareholders still own those shares, they're just worthless without the people, IP, assets, etc. In such a case, the non-cooperating shareholder might have grounds to sue but one defense can be a solid paper trail showing the company treated them fairly, offered to buy out their shares at fair market value and was basically forced into this as the only alternative.

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