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They are - with a very few exceptions - not your friend and should be seen as a very savvy business partner that could very well kill you to protect their inves
by time_management 18y ago
They are - with a very few exceptions - not your friend and should be seen as a very savvy business partner that could very well kill you to protect their investment, as they should.
How often is it good business practice to have a pissed-off founder out there? You're opening yourself up to talent raids, exposure of company dirty laundry, negative press, and future problems for all your portfolio companies.
- jacquesm 18y agoIf the pissed off founder and the investor are at loggerheads then that is a very difficult situation, which comes up with some regularity, unfortunately. How it is dealt with depends very much on the situation, I think that the recent 'moves' of Monty and some of the other people from MySQL are a good indication of what it can look like on the outside but I'm quite sure that the indoors conversations were quite different. The reason why is exactly the one you quote above, to avoid exposure of company dirty laundry, negative press and future problems. But I'm quite sure that in spite of all that it has gotten a little bit harder for sun to do acquisitions and for Monty et. al. to get acquired again with a future startup (not that he needs to, he's got enough cash to call it quits anyway).
- anamax 18y ago> You're opening yourself up to talent raids, exposure of company dirty laundry, Nope - there's an agreement covering that. The pissed off founder may win that lawsuit, but can she afford to? > negative press, and future problems for all your portfolio companies. Oh really? Sequoia Capital told its portfolio companies to lay off engineers, to treat them as contractors. How many entrepreneurs didn't pitch to Sequoia Capital as a result? How many engineers turned down jobs at SC's portfolio companies?