4 ms·

Power to the democratic shareholder masses! Down with monarchism in the board room! Seriously. If the founders don't want shareholders mucking with their pr

• Bootvis 14y ago
  Founders are not forced to make this choice as exemplified by the GP. If you don't like founders keeping control, don't buy their shares.
• debacle 14y ago
  Then how do they get your money?
• nknight 14y ago
  You speak of "going public" as if it's somehow turning over power to the general public. It's not. It's a colloquial term for a series of regulatory steps required to permit non-accredited investors to invest in a business. These steps are primarily designed not to exercise control over the operations of the company or its ownership and power structures, but to ensure a certain level of disclosure to investors whose resources and influence are limited. There is nothing about going public that implies a general relinquishment of control of the company, nor is there anything about going public that mandates a particular ownership or power structure. Companies have "gone public" by selling only a few percent of their stock. Split voting rights are very common. None of this is even remotely illegal or unethical so long as it is disclosed, as it has been here. If you do not like a company's control structure, you do not have to invest in it, whether the company is "public" or "private". As a shareholder, your relationship to the company is the same whether it's public or private.