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Flexport will lay off 20% of the company starting Friday, leaked memo says

businessinsider.com

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Re: Flexport will lay off 20% of the company starting Friday, leaked memo says

#3

Post by martypitt »

> With more than $1 billion in net cash, following this change, Flexport is now in a great position to take advantage of the opportunities in front of us to return to profitability as soon as the end of next year.

This feels like a tone-deaf statement to make in an email laying off 1 in 5 of your company.

"We're letting you go, but look how much cash we have!"

Re: Flexport will lay off 20% of the company starting Friday, leaked memo says

#4

Post by bagels »

martypitt wrote: post #3

> With more than $1 billion in net cash, following this change, Flexport is now in a great position to take advantage of the opportunities in front of us to return to profitability as soon as the end of next year. This feels like a tone-deaf statement to make in an email laying off 1 in 5 of your company. "We're letting you go, but look how much cash we have!"

The message is for the stock market, they're talking past the laid off people. I hope the have a more appropriate message for them.

Re: Flexport will lay off 20% of the company starting Friday, leaked memo says

#5

Post by hef19898 »

Burried in Petersons mail is one nugget every B2B start-up needs to take to heart:

>> It's clear that our customers want us to be a profitable company they can rely on to solve important problems in their supply chain.

An endless stream of VC money allowing you to sell dollars for dimes does not achieve that.

Also, I had a feeling that Flexport might run into problems one day, when Softbank invested, Softbank being such a harbinger of problems its only saving grace is setting Saudi money on fire. Also also, Flexport is the most impressive comoany coming out of YC if you ask me. All they have to do, is to aim being the next Schenker, Kühne & Nagel, XPO... instead of being the "global trade disruting tech thing" and they'll be fine.

Re: Flexport will lay off 20% of the company starting Friday, leaked memo says

#8

Post by braza »

hef19898 wrote: post #5

Burried in Petersons mail is one nugget every B2B start-up needs to take to heart: >> It's clear that our customers want us to be a profitable company they can rely on to solve important problems in their supply chain. An endless stream of VC money allowing you to sell dollars for dimes does not achieve that. Also, I had a feeling that Flexport might run into problems one day, when Softbank invested, Softbank being s…

> Also, I had a feeling that Flexport might run into problems one day, when Softbank invested, Softbank being such a harbinger of problems its only saving grace is setting Saudi money on fire. Also also, Flexport is the most impressive comoany coming out of YC if you ask me. All they have to do, is to aim being the next Schenker, Kühne & Nagel, XPO... instead of being the "global trade disruting tech thing" and they'll be fine.

One very underestimated aspects of the logistics business is trust. Specifically trust in your carrier/forward-freight/etc company.

The least thing that you as a SME and/or a BigCo. wants is to have one of the companies that deliver your physical goods (that implied some manufacturing and other resources in advance) being carrier for some unstable company[1] in terms of cash with financiers (e.g. Venture Capital) that characteristically has the reputation to make it or fail.

[1] - Of course airlines and some other companies has those two issues, but differently than most of VC business, in some cases the government and/or the market will come for a bail out.

Re: Flexport will lay off 20% of the company starting Friday, leaked memo says

#10

Post by kgwgk »

bagels wrote: post #4
martypitt wrote: post #3

> With more than $1 billion in net cash, following this change, Flexport is now in a great position to take advantage of the opportunities in front of us to return to profitability as soon as the end of next year. This feels like a tone-deaf statement to make in an email laying off 1 in 5 of your company. "We're letting you go, but look how much cash we have!"

The message is for the stock market, they're talking past the laid off people. I hope the have a more appropriate message for them.

Why would the “stock market” care? It explicitly talks about reassuring costumers.
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