mbesto

38 ms·

751.
by mbesto 4y ago
100% true. So people are aware, even if you get to an LOI, then there is usually an established close period (right now it's usually 30-90 days). That close period is intense and can absolutely derail the energy of the company.
752.
by mbesto 4y ago
"Surprise" could be interpreted a few different ways. Here's an example to elaborate: - Company being acquired ("Target") built a web based application in the mid-2000's using VB.NET and each client installed t
753.
by mbesto 4y ago
These are more business/commercial questions, but they typically manifest themselves in Tech DD when it comes to implementation, which is what we might look at.
754.
by mbesto 4y ago
I'll answer this in two parts: Me: I personally have a very atypical career so please take this with a grain of salt. That being said, I think my weird background helped me to excel in this space Here is my professional background
755.
by mbesto 4y ago
This is a very good summary of what deliverables look like.
756.
by mbesto 4y ago
More or less yes. The tooling for this is getting much better.
757.
by mbesto 4y ago
* What are the most common gotchas? Surprises! We don't like surprises, and nor do our clients. From a tech perspective - dated tech, unmanageable (or no clarity of) tech debt, NIH syndrom * What tools do you use to do the technical du
758.
by mbesto 4y ago
Can you be more specific? Do you mean like doing a DD on the product and sales strategy of the company that is being acquired?
759.
by mbesto 4y ago
Quite the contrary. The projects last 2~3 weeks.
760.
by mbesto 4y ago
I love this question since my career path is so irregular. It'll take some time so lemme write a more detailed response in a bit.
761.
by mbesto 4y ago
I'd love to share this, but unfortunately our reports belong to our clients so it would be really hard for to disclose an example to the public.
762.
by mbesto 4y ago
Unfortunately, I can't disclose that, but I can tell you what market rates tend to be. I've seen firms in this space charge anything from $10k to $150k per deal. The lower end tends to be the "one man shop" and the large
763.
by mbesto 4y ago
Exactly this. You don't pass or fail Tech DD...it's more to provide comfort to the buyer.
764.
by mbesto 4y ago
So we just advise on things that might constitute as "red flags", however ultimately our clients make the decision to break a deal. I would say its about 5%~10% rejection rate (some clients are more risky than others), and it&#x27
765.
by mbesto 4y ago
My firm doesn't acquire the companies themselves, we work with companies (like Gitlab) or private equity firms who acquire businesses to help them understand the technology. So our clients pick the startup and they usually have a thesi
766.
by mbesto 4y ago
More than happy for you to answer as well - I respect your opinion on this topic. P.S. - don't really appreciate the snarky "you should do some answering"... as a fellow busy professional, I'm answering when I have the t
767.
by mbesto 4y ago
> Do you think there's enough demand out there to have a company that does just technical (e.g. software quality, security) due diligence? My company (used to, we've grown to do other things) only do Tech DD and we've done
768.
by mbesto 4y ago
I think this is more of a technical/operational process, and less about the financial/legal one. Typically there is a "LOI" (Letter of Intent) that kicks off the DD process. That stipulates the acquisition price, any key
769.
by mbesto 4y ago
Since this documentation heavily refers to Technical Due Diligence processes, I thought I'd offer an "AmA" since this is what I do for a living (personally have conducted 400+ Tech DD projects). Disclaimer - I'm not a Gi
770.
by mbesto 4y ago
> I think you've ignored the context in which the comment was made. I would argue you did. The parent was being pedantic about the saying "revenue solves everything" and tried to make seem as if profit is the be-end-all.
771.
by mbesto 4y ago
You can have run a company for zero profit and it can still be a benefit to society, so no the "purpose of a company is to make profit" is not necessarily true. "If we want to know what a business is, we have to start with i
772.
by mbesto 4y ago
Okay cool. But, none of this addresses the opportunity cost. What happens if you don't hire fast and you miss revenue opportunities. As the saying goes "revenue solves everything".
773.
by mbesto 4y ago
I don't get it either. 100% agree with your sentiment. The HN mob in general is pretty level headed, but its like someone kicked over the beehive.
774.
by mbesto 4y ago
> Growing too fast is damaging to both culture and productivity. This seems to be general sentiment here lately. Do you have any evidence to support this or is purely conjecture?
775.
by mbesto 4y ago
> One wonders why Apple gets high praise for "hiring cautiously". Have you not read this forum for the past week? It's been riddled with techies ragging on tech CEO's for "blaming the economy" and not blamin
776.
by mbesto 4y ago
> Instead, Gitlab explicitly blamed economy-wide conditions for these layoffs, and that is what I take issue with. The economy is doing well. And a macro-environment doesn't refer to just the economy. Per wikipedia: "The macro
777.
by mbesto 4y ago
Super interesting - I did a search on a common business name like "Dropbox" and its clear some ads show up. Wonder if there is any way to parse these out so they don't show in the results?
778.
by mbesto 4y ago
> I’m young (35) but I’ve never seen layoffs so continuous. Go read up on the .com bubble popping. The layoffs look huge because the increase in headcounts were so huge in the past 2 years: https://bsmedia.business-standard.co
779.
by mbesto 4y ago
> No, it isn't, and it's embarrassing at this point to continue insisting this. Your macro is not the macro that Gitlab is referring to. It's disingenuous to interpret it otherwise. All of these tech companies "overhi
780.
by mbesto 4y ago
> The growth over the last two years was clearly going to be a temporary blip. I'm sorry, but this is the most hindsight is 20/20, armchair CEO thing I've ever heard. Unless you have some sort of magic 8 ball, there was n

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