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$3 billion is what Zuckerberg offered to acquire Snapchat. Given all the cultural cachet and freedom I think they came out ahead. http://mashable.com/2014/01/06

$3 billion is what Zuckerberg offered to acquire Snapchat. Given all the cultural cachet and freedom I think they came out ahead. http://mashable.com/2014/01/06/snapchat-facebook-acquisition-2/#YPbz0JAbiiq9 http://mashable.com/2014/01/06/snapchat-facebook-acquisition...

sgift 10y ago
Only if they still exist in a few years. They wouldn't be the first company with a great IPO that didn't survive for long.
- ams6110 10y ago
  The space is hugely fad-driven anyway. Kids don't use Facebook. They use Snap, for now. Who knows in a few years. Twitter and Facebook are what their parents use.
  - adamlett 10y ago
    Facebook has close to 2 billion monthly active users (MAU). Instagram and WhatsApp – both owned by Facebook – each has around half a billion MAU. Your comment reads as "nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded".
- stale2002 10y ago
  The people who sold their stock options have already come out ahead. Whether or not the people who bought those shares go under water isn't their problem. AKA, the early investors are going to make way way more money than if they had sold to facebook.
  - Akarnani 10y ago
    Everyone who has options is likely still locked up.
  - mikeyouse 10y ago
    Snap amended their employee ESOP deal so that the employees can sell their shares at the same time as investors -- 150 days post-IPO. https://www.theinformation.com/snap-changed-employee-lockup-period https://www.theinformation.com/snap-changed-employee-lockup-...
drzaiusapelord 10y ago
Also look at how Zuck bought Oculus and turned it from VR fan favorite to this horrible Facebook division that inches away from PC VR everyday and into social and mobile spaces. Worse, it embraced the toxic politics of exclusives and couldn't keep its promises on ballpark pricing, delivery dates, openness, etc. The Snapchat guys didn't want to be Palmer Luckey'd. They got the cash and kept their reputation. That's quite the win.
- onewaystreet 10y ago
  > Also look at how Zuck bought Oculus and turned it from VR fan favorite to this horrible Facebook division that inches away from PC VR everyday and into social and mobile spaces. Because that's where the users are. PC VR is going to be a very small niche in the larger AR/VR space.
  - SerLava 10y ago
    Maybe eventually, but early VR on mobile devices is crap. Even PC VR is pretty rough. They need one or two more generations before they can cram a quality experience into a phone.
    - awad 10y ago
      I am just an anecdote but even as a founder of a tech startup who is highly plugged in, I ~barely~ use a PC when not in the office for non-work purposes and most of my immediate network is at best on par and worse completely off the PC bandwagon for almost all personal use.
      - bigbugbag 10y ago
        As someone who deals with normal people and their computer/internet needs, your experience does not reflect population at large. Many regular people hate you for pushing things and change they didn't ask for and do not want on them. Further more, this experience of population at large is not reflecting the actual experience of most of the population of the world that has little to no exposure to computers or internet. But when designing for your kind in a vacuum you will encounter some success among your peers.
mikeyouse 10y ago
Given that they raised more money after that and have a completely different ownership structure, it's clear they came out ahead. Facebook offered to buy 100% of Snapchat for $3 billion. Today, Spiegel's ownership share in the public company is worth more than $5.5 billion. Snap's market cap is ~$24 billion.
- trendia 10y ago
  They're "worth" $24b but losing $500m a year...
  - mikeyouse 10y ago
    It's ironic that we're having this conversation again in a thread about Snapchat's relationship to Facebook. Facebook was "Worth" $92 billion when they IPOed and most people on HN lost their minds about how overvalued they were when the stock dipped on that first day: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4002730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4002730 Now Facebook's equity is worth $400 billion. Amazon IPOed in 1997.. they didn't "make money" for over a decade, and even then, it was a tiny return. In the mean time, they built a massive business that's worth more than $430 billion today. Whether or not a company is making money in the most recent quarter has very little to do with their prospects.
    - xiaoma 10y ago
      Yes. It reminds me of DHH's loud proclamation that Facebook was not worth $33B. He'd have gotten a great return if he'd just bought some of their stock at that price instead of this: >"Oh, well, but maybe Facebook just needs to mature, you say. If we give them just a few more years, the profit fairy might drop by and sprinkle her billions all over Facebook and its shareholders. I call fat chance." https://signalvnoise.com/posts/2585-facebook-is-not-worth-33000000000 https://signalvnoise.com/posts/2585-facebook-is-not-worth-33...
      - thr0waway1239 10y ago
        So this article was written in 2010. FB's trajectory after that point had a few step functions which had nothing to do with talent or execution (i.e. more predictable factors), but the remarkable mutual back scratching arrangement going on between governments and Facebook (and similar companies). For example, I don't know how anyone in their right mind would have allowed the FB - WhatsApp acquisition to happen after seeing the price tag. I really doubt if anyone who understands technology still thinks this wasn't a sweetheart deal between the govt and FB. The other step function is the US government's (and probably other governments) decision to simply look away on privacy issues as soon as they saw the huge benefits of having a tame populace unable to untether themselves from the top social networks (i.e. less stuff to monitor). This is all the more bizarre when you notice how the privacy intrusion has basically moved to a stage where just about anything goes, and not one person is actually able to function in the economy without accepting a drastic reduction in privacy. By which I mean, it is only a matter of time when this is going to turn against the politicos who helped usher in this era. In fact, we are already seeing this in some cases. It seems like the people who are reaching the top positions in politics seem to be disgustingly shameless. The more regular, normal politician is unable to withstand/ignore the scrutiny of all the skeletons in their closet. While that may be a good thing (the scrutiny), the outcome where the most shameless person becomes the leader by default is not. You are taking huge risks when trying to understand what manipulations governments around the world would resort to when trying to predict currency movements. You take a similar risk in predicting the trajectory of private companies which manage to acquire enormous quantities of data because you don't know what kind of mutual back scratching arrangements that is going to set up in the future.

sgift 10y ago

Only if they still exist in a few years. They wouldn't be the first company with a great IPO that didn't survive for long.

ams6110 10y ago
The space is hugely fad-driven anyway. Kids don't use Facebook. They use Snap, for now. Who knows in a few years. Twitter and Facebook are what their parents use.
- adamlett 10y ago
  Facebook has close to 2 billion monthly active users (MAU). Instagram and WhatsApp – both owned by Facebook – each has around half a billion MAU. Your comment reads as "nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded".
stale2002 10y ago
The people who sold their stock options have already come out ahead. Whether or not the people who bought those shares go under water isn't their problem. AKA, the early investors are going to make way way more money than if they had sold to facebook.
- Akarnani 10y ago
  Everyone who has options is likely still locked up.
- mikeyouse 10y ago
  Snap amended their employee ESOP deal so that the employees can sell their shares at the same time as investors -- 150 days post-IPO. https://www.theinformation.com/snap-changed-employee-lockup-period https://www.theinformation.com/snap-changed-employee-lockup-...

drzaiusapelord 10y ago

Also look at how Zuck bought Oculus and turned it from VR fan favorite to this horrible Facebook division that inches away from PC VR everyday and into social and mobile spaces. Worse, it embraced the toxic politics of exclusives and couldn't keep its promises on ballpark pricing, delivery dates, openness, etc. The Snapchat guys didn't want to be Palmer Luckey'd. They got the cash and kept their reputation. That's quite the win.

onewaystreet 10y ago
> Also look at how Zuck bought Oculus and turned it from VR fan favorite to this horrible Facebook division that inches away from PC VR everyday and into social and mobile spaces. Because that's where the users are. PC VR is going to be a very small niche in the larger AR/VR space.
- SerLava 10y ago
  Maybe eventually, but early VR on mobile devices is crap. Even PC VR is pretty rough. They need one or two more generations before they can cram a quality experience into a phone.
  - awad 10y ago
    I am just an anecdote but even as a founder of a tech startup who is highly plugged in, I ~barely~ use a PC when not in the office for non-work purposes and most of my immediate network is at best on par and worse completely off the PC bandwagon for almost all personal use.
    - bigbugbag 10y ago
      As someone who deals with normal people and their computer/internet needs, your experience does not reflect population at large. Many regular people hate you for pushing things and change they didn't ask for and do not want on them. Further more, this experience of population at large is not reflecting the actual experience of most of the population of the world that has little to no exposure to computers or internet. But when designing for your kind in a vacuum you will encounter some success among your peers.

mikeyouse 10y ago

Given that they raised more money after that and have a completely different ownership structure, it's clear they came out ahead. Facebook offered to buy 100% of Snapchat for $3 billion. Today, Spiegel's ownership share in the public company is worth more than $5.5 billion. Snap's market cap is ~$24 billion.

trendia 10y ago
They're "worth" $24b but losing $500m a year...
- mikeyouse 10y ago
  It's ironic that we're having this conversation again in a thread about Snapchat's relationship to Facebook. Facebook was "Worth" $92 billion when they IPOed and most people on HN lost their minds about how overvalued they were when the stock dipped on that first day: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4002730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4002730 Now Facebook's equity is worth $400 billion. Amazon IPOed in 1997.. they didn't "make money" for over a decade, and even then, it was a tiny return. In the mean time, they built a massive business that's worth more than $430 billion today. Whether or not a company is making money in the most recent quarter has very little to do with their prospects.
  - xiaoma 10y ago
    Yes. It reminds me of DHH's loud proclamation that Facebook was not worth $33B. He'd have gotten a great return if he'd just bought some of their stock at that price instead of this: >"Oh, well, but maybe Facebook just needs to mature, you say. If we give them just a few more years, the profit fairy might drop by and sprinkle her billions all over Facebook and its shareholders. I call fat chance." https://signalvnoise.com/posts/2585-facebook-is-not-worth-33000000000 https://signalvnoise.com/posts/2585-facebook-is-not-worth-33...
    - thr0waway1239 10y ago
      So this article was written in 2010. FB's trajectory after that point had a few step functions which had nothing to do with talent or execution (i.e. more predictable factors), but the remarkable mutual back scratching arrangement going on between governments and Facebook (and similar companies). For example, I don't know how anyone in their right mind would have allowed the FB - WhatsApp acquisition to happen after seeing the price tag. I really doubt if anyone who understands technology still thinks this wasn't a sweetheart deal between the govt and FB. The other step function is the US government's (and probably other governments) decision to simply look away on privacy issues as soon as they saw the huge benefits of having a tame populace unable to untether themselves from the top social networks (i.e. less stuff to monitor). This is all the more bizarre when you notice how the privacy intrusion has basically moved to a stage where just about anything goes, and not one person is actually able to function in the economy without accepting a drastic reduction in privacy. By which I mean, it is only a matter of time when this is going to turn against the politicos who helped usher in this era. In fact, we are already seeing this in some cases. It seems like the people who are reaching the top positions in politics seem to be disgustingly shameless. The more regular, normal politician is unable to withstand/ignore the scrutiny of all the skeletons in their closet. While that may be a good thing (the scrutiny), the outcome where the most shameless person becomes the leader by default is not. You are taking huge risks when trying to understand what manipulations governments around the world would resort to when trying to predict currency movements. You take a similar risk in predicting the trajectory of private companies which manage to acquire enormous quantities of data because you don't know what kind of mutual back scratching arrangements that is going to set up in the future.