$1.5 million, according to Steve Newcomb (co-founder of Powerset): "At that time we knew that a talented engineer in a tough to get tech was worth about $1.5 m

$1.5 million, according to Steve Newcomb (co-founder of Powerset): "At that time we knew that a talented engineer in a tough to get tech was worth about $1.5 million per head. Thus, I knew with relative assurance that since we were going to hire at least 70 people with our Series A money, that our worst case scenario was about a $100 million exit. If anyone is paying attention, you are now saying, wait a minute! Didn't Powerset sell for $100 million to MSFT? .... Yup, we nailed our worse case scenario!" (from http://blognewcomb.squarespace.com/essays/2010/10/14/cult-creation.html http://blognewcomb.squarespace.com/essays/2010/10/14/cult-cr...)