科技媒體非常善于榨取初創(chuàng)公司融資公告中的每一點(diǎn)一滴信息量,。它們雖然可能無法控制輿論的走向,卻提供了足夠的推助力,。但就揭示初創(chuàng)企業(yè)退出競爭背后的復(fù)雜性而言,,這些記者和出版物卻沒有那么在行。
所有的初創(chuàng)公司收購公告基本都是按照這個模式寫就的:
初創(chuàng)公司X即將被大公司Y收購,,具體收購金額不詳,。
這其實(shí)并沒有什么用,因?yàn)榇罅康木W(wǎng)絡(luò)資源保證了融資過程的信息透明度,,但卻沒有人能夠始終如一地報(bào)道被收購公司的真實(shí)情況?,F(xiàn)在甚至出現(xiàn)了收購博文生成器,初創(chuàng)企業(yè)可以借此在不透露任何有效信息的前提下生成與收購相關(guān)的內(nèi)容,。
那么,,為什么融資公告能夠具備很高的透明度,但有關(guān)初創(chuàng)公司退出競爭的消息卻完全不透明呢,?
一般情況下,,這都是因?yàn)樗^的“好消息”其實(shí)并沒有那么好。
想象一下,,假設(shè)某初創(chuàng)公司已經(jīng)融資約7500萬美元,。老實(shí)說,該公司做得并不好,,幾年來一直在行業(yè)內(nèi)的次垂直領(lǐng)域打發(fā)時間,,身邊滿是更優(yōu)秀的競爭對手。董事會和投資方則一直在給該公司施壓,,希望最終可以實(shí)現(xiàn)目標(biāo),。投資者對該公司發(fā)展后勁不足的擔(dān)憂不無道理:“投資都用在哪里了?燒錢率為什么這么高,?”
這家初創(chuàng)公司隨后宣布,,公司已經(jīng)被同行業(yè)的一家大公司“收購”。收購公司與這家初創(chuàng)公司處于同一垂直領(lǐng)域,,更收購了其他多家公司,,而這些被收購的公司都有一個共同點(diǎn):它們都接近或正處于危急狀態(tài)。
我一般會將這種交易稱為“假性收購”,,因?yàn)殡m然它表面看起來跟真正的收購相差無幾,,但卻有著完全不同的氣味和觸感。它就像是商店櫥窗里展示的那碗塑料拉面,,看起來很美好,,但是實(shí)際上并非如此。
當(dāng)然,,收購可能是別有用心的,。曾經(jīng)被谷歌(Google)收購的Milk和Sparrow都是很好的例證,。前者的創(chuàng)始人曾經(jīng)在谷歌當(dāng)時的新風(fēng)險投資結(jié)構(gòu)中扮演關(guān)鍵角色,。而谷歌收購后者的目的,,是要直接扼殺許多用戶眼中遠(yuǎn)優(yōu)于谷歌的產(chǎn)品,。但規(guī)模更小的假性收購每天都在發(fā)生。
對于被收購公司的創(chuàng)始人,、員工和投資者來說,假性收購難道不是一件好事情嗎,?你現(xiàn)在融入了一家更大、更穩(wěn)定的企業(yè)及其收購的其他公司(其中幾家還是你的競爭對手),,成為了其中的一部分,。
不一定,。當(dāng)你的公司被假性收購后,,你的股份轉(zhuǎn)換成了一家大公司的股份,因?yàn)榧傩允召弿牟簧婕艾F(xiàn)金,。但這并不是谷歌的股份,。這家大公司的內(nèi)部也有著各種問題,比如它一直收購像你這樣的小公司,,寄期望于其中一家公司可以賦予其某種神奇助力,助其打入行業(yè)頂峰,。
被收購公司的投資者可能會覺得自己晚上終于能夠睡個好覺了,。但現(xiàn)在,他們擁有的不再是此前所投資公司的一大部分,,而是一家大公司的一小部分,,而這家大公司內(nèi)部的裂隙對于所有人來說都是顯而易見的。
數(shù)學(xué)及信息傳遞
核心問題是,,風(fēng)險投資數(shù)學(xué)的難度是很高的,。
風(fēng)險投資公司需要至少有3倍的投資回報(bào)率,,才可以實(shí)現(xiàn)風(fēng)險回報(bào)率。風(fēng)險投資公司的人們在進(jìn)行每一筆交易時都知道,,他們每四筆交易中至少有三筆會失敗,。一批特定投資中的另外三筆(甚至六筆)通常表現(xiàn)“不錯”,,因?yàn)樗鼈兡軌蚍颠€原始投資。最后,,還會有一兩筆表現(xiàn)很好的投資,,足以讓歷史將其視為投資者的顯著回報(bào)。
顯著的回報(bào)之所以對這幾筆投資如此重要,,是因?yàn)樗梢宰屖?xiàng)投資的總和達(dá)到關(guān)鍵的風(fēng)險回報(bào)率,。在這個已經(jīng)有人開始質(zhì)疑風(fēng)險投資是否值得的時代,這一點(diǎn)的重要性再怎么強(qiáng)調(diào)都不為過,。
復(fù)雜的數(shù)學(xué)在此陷入了絕境,。在本文所討論的假性收購示例中,,大公司Y的股票對初創(chuàng)公司X的投資者來說沒有任何作用。足夠幸運(yùn)的情況下,,他們能夠在某個時候收回對初創(chuàng)公司X的投資,,但發(fā)生這種情況的概率并不大。而他們最終幾近一無所獲的概率則要大得多,。
當(dāng)我們細(xì)致入微地披露融資細(xì)節(jié)時,,整個創(chuàng)業(yè)社區(qū)實(shí)際上都收到了損害,因?yàn)槲覀儼讶谫Y細(xì)節(jié)當(dāng)作了比實(shí)際情況更重要的東西,。一家初創(chuàng)公司獲得風(fēng)投資金,,僅僅是一場戰(zhàn)役的勝利,而不是整場戰(zhàn)爭,。有關(guān)初創(chuàng)企業(yè)被收購或關(guān)閉的模糊信息則損害著參與其中的每個人,,特別是需要對下一步行動做出戰(zhàn)略決策的投資方以及其他初創(chuàng)企業(yè)創(chuàng)始人,。
這個問題并沒有輕松簡單的解決方案,。從種子期到最終退出,將初創(chuàng)公司融資過程的各個部分透明化是不現(xiàn)實(shí)的,。有太多的人參與到了各個環(huán)節(jié)中,,所以公告不可能這樣寫:
我們原本滿懷希望。在創(chuàng)業(yè)初期,,我們并沒有接受投資,。但結(jié)果證明,這是一個巨大的錯誤,。決定接受風(fēng)險投資后,,我們也曾經(jīng)奮力追趕,卻耗盡了現(xiàn)金,、耐心和精力,。部分創(chuàng)始人和團(tuán)隊(duì)成員會繼續(xù)留任,但大多數(shù)團(tuán)隊(duì)成員將離開公司,。在此,,我們謹(jǐn)向投資者、員工以及所有曾經(jīng)幫助過我們的人誠摯致歉,。
相反,,我們常常見到的是這樣的行文:
初創(chuàng)公司X+大公司Y
自2021年10月27日起,初創(chuàng)公司X將停止運(yùn)營,。
我們要向每一位曾經(jīng)使用過我公司產(chǎn)品的用戶表達(dá)最誠摯的謝意,,可以為您提供服務(wù)是我們最大的榮幸。未來,,我們希望能夠作為大公司Y的一部分,,繼續(xù)為您打造更多的優(yōu)質(zhì)產(chǎn)品,。
初創(chuàng)公司X團(tuán)隊(duì)
沒錯,這段話就是由上文提到的收購博文生成器創(chuàng)建的,。(財(cái)富中文網(wǎng))
阿倫·所羅門,,法學(xué)博士,Esquire Digital戰(zhàn)略主管兼首席法律分析師,。他曾經(jīng)在麥吉爾大學(xué)(McGill University)和賓夕法尼亞大學(xué)(University of Pennsylvania)教授創(chuàng)業(yè)學(xué),,并入選Fastcase 50——全球50位法律領(lǐng)軍創(chuàng)新人士之一。阿倫曾經(jīng)在CBS新聞(CBS News),、TechCrunch,、The Hill、BuzzFeed,、《財(cái)富》,、Venture Beat、《獨(dú)立報(bào)》(The Independent),、雅虎(Yahoo),、ABA Journal、Law.com,、《波士頓環(huán)球報(bào)》(The Boston Globe)等眾多知名媒體上發(fā)表過評論意見,。
譯者:張翯
科技媒體非常善于榨取初創(chuàng)公司融資公告中的每一點(diǎn)一滴信息量。它們雖然可能無法控制輿論的走向,,卻提供了足夠的推助力,。但就揭示初創(chuàng)企業(yè)退出競爭背后的復(fù)雜性而言,這些記者和出版物卻沒有那么在行,。
所有的初創(chuàng)公司收購公告基本都是按照這個模式寫就的:
初創(chuàng)公司X即將被大公司Y收購,,具體收購金額不詳。
這其實(shí)并沒有什么用,,因?yàn)榇罅康木W(wǎng)絡(luò)資源保證了融資過程的信息透明度,,但卻沒有人能夠始終如一地報(bào)道被收購公司的真實(shí)情況。現(xiàn)在甚至出現(xiàn)了收購博文生成器,,初創(chuàng)企業(yè)可以借此在不透露任何有效信息的前提下生成與收購相關(guān)的內(nèi)容,。
那么,為什么融資公告能夠具備很高的透明度,,但有關(guān)初創(chuàng)公司退出競爭的消息卻完全不透明呢,?
一般情況下,這都是因?yàn)樗^的“好消息”其實(shí)并沒有那么好,。
想象一下,,假設(shè)某初創(chuàng)公司已經(jīng)融資約7500萬美元。老實(shí)說,,該公司做得并不好,,幾年來一直在行業(yè)內(nèi)的次垂直領(lǐng)域打發(fā)時間,,身邊滿是更優(yōu)秀的競爭對手。董事會和投資方則一直在給該公司施壓,,希望最終可以實(shí)現(xiàn)目標(biāo),。投資者對該公司發(fā)展后勁不足的擔(dān)憂不無道理:“投資都用在哪里了?燒錢率為什么這么高,?”
這家初創(chuàng)公司隨后宣布,,公司已經(jīng)被同行業(yè)的一家大公司“收購”。收購公司與這家初創(chuàng)公司處于同一垂直領(lǐng)域,,更收購了其他多家公司,,而這些被收購的公司都有一個共同點(diǎn):它們都接近或正處于危急狀態(tài)。
我一般會將這種交易稱為“假性收購”,,因?yàn)殡m然它表面看起來跟真正的收購相差無幾,,但卻有著完全不同的氣味和觸感。它就像是商店櫥窗里展示的那碗塑料拉面,,看起來很美好,,但是實(shí)際上并非如此。
當(dāng)然,,收購可能是別有用心的,。曾經(jīng)被谷歌(Google)收購的Milk和Sparrow都是很好的例證,。前者的創(chuàng)始人曾經(jīng)在谷歌當(dāng)時的新風(fēng)險投資結(jié)構(gòu)中扮演關(guān)鍵角色,。而谷歌收購后者的目的,是要直接扼殺許多用戶眼中遠(yuǎn)優(yōu)于谷歌的產(chǎn)品,。但規(guī)模更小的假性收購每天都在發(fā)生,。
對于被收購公司的創(chuàng)始人、員工和投資者來說,,假性收購難道不是一件好事情嗎,?你現(xiàn)在融入了一家更大、更穩(wěn)定的企業(yè)及其收購的其他公司(其中幾家還是你的競爭對手),,成為了其中的一部分,。
不一定。當(dāng)你的公司被假性收購后,,你的股份轉(zhuǎn)換成了一家大公司的股份,,因?yàn)榧傩允召弿牟簧婕艾F(xiàn)金。但這并不是谷歌的股份,。這家大公司的內(nèi)部也有著各種問題,,比如它一直收購像你這樣的小公司,寄期望于其中一家公司可以賦予其某種神奇助力,,助其打入行業(yè)頂峰,。
被收購公司的投資者可能會覺得自己晚上終于能夠睡個好覺了,。但現(xiàn)在,他們擁有的不再是此前所投資公司的一大部分,,而是一家大公司的一小部分,,而這家大公司內(nèi)部的裂隙對于所有人來說都是顯而易見的。
數(shù)學(xué)及信息傳遞
核心問題是,,風(fēng)險投資數(shù)學(xué)的難度是很高的,。
風(fēng)險投資公司需要至少有3倍的投資回報(bào)率,才可以實(shí)現(xiàn)風(fēng)險回報(bào)率,。風(fēng)險投資公司的人們在進(jìn)行每一筆交易時都知道,,他們每四筆交易中至少有三筆會失敗。一批特定投資中的另外三筆(甚至六筆)通常表現(xiàn)“不錯”,,因?yàn)樗鼈兡軌蚍颠€原始投資,。最后,還會有一兩筆表現(xiàn)很好的投資,,足以讓歷史將其視為投資者的顯著回報(bào),。
顯著的回報(bào)之所以對這幾筆投資如此重要,是因?yàn)樗梢宰屖?xiàng)投資的總和達(dá)到關(guān)鍵的風(fēng)險回報(bào)率,。在這個已經(jīng)有人開始質(zhì)疑風(fēng)險投資是否值得的時代,,這一點(diǎn)的重要性再怎么強(qiáng)調(diào)都不為過。
復(fù)雜的數(shù)學(xué)在此陷入了絕境,。在本文所討論的假性收購示例中,,大公司Y的股票對初創(chuàng)公司X的投資者來說沒有任何作用。足夠幸運(yùn)的情況下,,他們能夠在某個時候收回對初創(chuàng)公司X的投資,,但發(fā)生這種情況的概率并不大。而他們最終幾近一無所獲的概率則要大得多,。
當(dāng)我們細(xì)致入微地披露融資細(xì)節(jié)時,,整個創(chuàng)業(yè)社區(qū)實(shí)際上都收到了損害,因?yàn)槲覀儼讶谫Y細(xì)節(jié)當(dāng)作了比實(shí)際情況更重要的東西,。一家初創(chuàng)公司獲得風(fēng)投資金,,僅僅是一場戰(zhàn)役的勝利,而不是整場戰(zhàn)爭,。有關(guān)初創(chuàng)企業(yè)被收購或關(guān)閉的模糊信息則損害著參與其中的每個人,,特別是需要對下一步行動做出戰(zhàn)略決策的投資方以及其他初創(chuàng)企業(yè)創(chuàng)始人。
這個問題并沒有輕松簡單的解決方案,。從種子期到最終退出,,將初創(chuàng)公司融資過程的各個部分透明化是不現(xiàn)實(shí)的。有太多的人參與到了各個環(huán)節(jié)中,所以公告不可能這樣寫:
我們原本滿懷希望,。在創(chuàng)業(yè)初期,,我們并沒有接受投資。但結(jié)果證明,,這是一個巨大的錯誤,。決定接受風(fēng)險投資后,我們也曾經(jīng)奮力追趕,,卻耗盡了現(xiàn)金,、耐心和精力。部分創(chuàng)始人和團(tuán)隊(duì)成員會繼續(xù)留任,,但大多數(shù)團(tuán)隊(duì)成員將離開公司,。在此,我們謹(jǐn)向投資者,、員工以及所有曾經(jīng)幫助過我們的人誠摯致歉,。
相反,我們常常見到的是這樣的行文:
初創(chuàng)公司X+大公司Y
自2021年10月27日起,,初創(chuàng)公司X將停止運(yùn)營,。
我們要向每一位曾經(jīng)使用過我公司產(chǎn)品的用戶表達(dá)最誠摯的謝意,可以為您提供服務(wù)是我們最大的榮幸,。未來,,我們希望能夠作為大公司Y的一部分,繼續(xù)為您打造更多的優(yōu)質(zhì)產(chǎn)品,。
初創(chuàng)公司X團(tuán)隊(duì)
沒錯,,這段話就是由上文提到的收購博文生成器創(chuàng)建的。(財(cái)富中文網(wǎng))
阿倫·所羅門,,法學(xué)博士,,Esquire Digital戰(zhàn)略主管兼首席法律分析師,。他曾經(jīng)在麥吉爾大學(xué)(McGill University)和賓夕法尼亞大學(xué)(University of Pennsylvania)教授創(chuàng)業(yè)學(xué),,并入選Fastcase 50——全球50位法律領(lǐng)軍創(chuàng)新人士之一。阿倫曾經(jīng)在CBS新聞(CBS News),、TechCrunch,、The Hill、BuzzFeed,、《財(cái)富》,、Venture Beat、《獨(dú)立報(bào)》(The Independent),、雅虎(Yahoo),、ABA Journal、Law.com、《波士頓環(huán)球報(bào)》(The Boston Globe)等眾多知名媒體上發(fā)表過評論意見,。
譯者:張翯
Tech media is great at squeezing every bit of juice out of a startup funding announcement. While they may not be conducting the hype train, they are shoveling the coal. Yet these same journalists and publications are really not as great about shedding light on the intricacies of startup exits.
Almost every startup acquisition announcement reads like this:
Startup X is set to be acquired by BigCo Y for an undisclosed amount.
This isn’t really helpful given that plenty of online sources bring transparency to the funding process, yet not one consistently tells a realistic story about companies that are acquired. In fact, there is now even an acquisition blog post generator to help startups say everything and nothing at the same time about their own acquisition.
So why are announcements of funding rounds so transparent while news of exits is equally opaque?
It’s often because the good news isn’t so good.
Imagine a hypothetical startup that has raised around $75 million. They honestly haven't been doing great, kicking around for a few years in a subvertical within their industry that is filling up with more and better competitors. The board and their investors are putting pressure on the company to finally make things happen. The investors justifiably fear that the company is running out of runway: “Sorry, where did all the money go? Why is your burn rate so high?”
Our hypothetical startup then announces an “acquisition” by a larger company in the same industry. The acquiring company is a regular acquirer of other companies in the same vertical as this startup and they all have one thing in common: they are on life support or very close.
I like to call this kind of transaction a fauxquisition because while it looks like an acquisition from the outside, it doesn’t smell or feel like one. It’s the bowl of plastic ramen in the shop window that always looks so good but, well, yeah.
Of course, acquisitions can have ulterior motives. Milk and Sparrow, both acquired by Google, are good examples of the concept. In the former, its founder was essentially brought on to play a key role in Google’s then-new VC structure. In the latter, it was an acquisition to straight-up kill what many users felt was a product far superior to Google’s. However, smaller fauxquisitions happen every day.
Isn’t this all good for the founders, employees, and investors in the company that was acquired? You’re now part of a larger and more stable business, along with all the other companies that they acquired, some of which were your competitors.
Not necessarily. When your company was acquired in a fauxquisition, your shares were converted into shares in the larger company because a fauxquisition never involves cash. But these are not Google shares. That company has a mess of their own problems and part of that mess is that they can’t stop acquiring companies like yours in the hope that one of them will provide a magic product pill to finally energize them and send them into the industry stratosphere.
The investors in the company that was acquired might think they can sleep better at night, but now, instead of owning a larger percentage of a company they invested early in, they own a very small percentage of a much larger company whose internal cracks are evident to anyone in the building.
Math and Messaging
The core problem here is that VC math is hard.
A VC needs an absolute minimum of a 3x rate of return on their investment to achieve a venture rate of return. VCs go into every deal knowing that at least three out of every four deals that they make will fail. Another three (or even six) in a particular batch of investments will typically do “okay,” in that they will return the original investment. Finally, another one or two will do well enough for history to treat it as a notable return for the investor.
The reason the significant return is so critical on those few investments is to get the totality of the 10 investments to achieve that critical venture rate of return. In an era where some are beginning to question whether venture capital is worth the risk, the importance of this can’t be overstated.
Here is where the hard math hits an even harder wall. In the example of the fauxquisition that is the subject of this piece, shares in BigCo Y aren’t going to do a thing for the investors in Startup X. With luck, they’ll get the value of their investment into Startup X back at some point, but that’s a long shot. There’s a far better chance they’re going to end up with close to zero.
The entire startup community does itself a disservice when we get granular with details of financing rounds because we hold it out as something more important than it actually is. A startup getting VC funding is simply the winning of one battle, not a war. Vague messaging around startups being acquired or shutting down hurts everyone involved, particularly investors and founders of other startups who need to make strategic decisions about what to do next.
There’s no painless solution for this. Transparency in all parts of the startup financing process, from pre-seed to exit, simply isn’t going to happen. There are far too many people involved on all ends of the equation for announcements to look like this:
Hi. We had high hopes. We didn’t take investment for the first few years as a startup and that turned out to be a huge mistake. Once we made the decision to take venture money, we tried our best to play catch-up but ran out of cash, patience, and energy. Some founders and team members will be able to stay on but most won’t. We’re sorry - to our investors, employees, and everyone who tried to help.
Instead, what we get is this:
Startup X + BigCo Y
As of October 27, 2021, Startup X is closing operations.
We would like to extend a special thank you to all of you who have used our products so far. It continues to be a pleasure to serve you, and we hope to continue to build more exciting products for you in the future as part of BigCo Y.
The Startup X Team
And, yes, that was created by the acquisition blog post generator referenced above.
Aron Solomon, JD, is the Head of Strategy and Chief Legal Analyst for Esquire Digital. He has taught entrepreneurship at McGill University and the University of Pennsylvania, and was elected to Fastcase 50, recognizing the top 50 legal innovators in the world. Aron has been featured in CBS News, TechCrunch, The Hill, BuzzFeed, Fortune, Venture Beat, The Independent, Yahoo!, ABA Journal, Law.com, The Boston Globe, and many other leading publications.