Leveraged buyouts: you borrow a bunch of money, buy the company with it, use any stored cash to pay that down, and saddle the company with the debt you used to

Leveraged buyouts: you borrow a bunch of money, buy the company with it, use any stored cash to pay that down, and saddle the company with the debt you used to buy the company in the first place. Then you repeat this a couple of times to buy up portfolio of related companies that might be better together than competing, reshape them and put them back on the public market at a profit. Debt repayment from free cash flow is appealing because it's comparatively less risky. Startups building products have no free cash flow to speak of and require regular VC cash infusions to balance the books.