The Investments Where I’m Going to Lose All My Money
So when I started writing venture checks in 2013, I didn’t know what I was doing, but I had a strong start: First was Pipedrive co-leading seed, then acquired for $1.5B cash Second was Algolia leading U.S. seed, now at $200m+ ARR and an IPO candidate Third was...
Dear SaaStr: How Do I Know If It’s The Right Time to Sell My Company?
Dear SaaStr: How Do I Know If It’s The Right Time to Sell My Company? First off, the axiom that companies are bought, not sold, is mostly right. 95 times out of 100, you can’t wake up some morning and just go sell your start-up. Unless there are...
Dear SaaStr: What’s It Like to Have Your Company Acquired by One of the Tech Giants?
Dear SaaStr: What’s It Like to Have Your Company Acquired by One of the Tech Giants? It’s a lot of change. The pressure is mostly or at least partially off. Unless there is a huge earn-out or retention payment tied to performance, the pressure is off. Not all of...
The Big 3 IPOs Will Dwarf Everything Else Since 2000. Combined.
SpaceX filed confidentially with the SEC on April 1. OpenAI just closed the largest private funding round in Silicon Valley history at $122 billion. Anthropic is targeting a potential October listing. The Big 3. PitchBook put it in one line: these three listings would...
The Great Myth of the Liquidation Preference: Yes, It Matters. But Not In Many Scenarios.
If you’ve raised venture capital—or even just read about it—you’ve heard the warnings about liquidation preferences. It’s a common grouch on LinkedIn. “The VCs get paid first!” “You could build a $100m company and walk away with...
“The Dumbest Idea I’ve Ever Heard” — How Own Became a $2B Salesforce Acquisition
A SaaStr AI deep dive with Sam Gutmann, CEO of Own, on building a billion-dollar backup company by saying “no” to almost everything. He joined Harpinder Singh (Partner, Innovation Endeavors) to share the whole story — and his top mistakes. And come...
Meritech’s Look at 2025 Exits: M&A at $587B Hits a Decade+ High … But IPOs Were a Whimper
The quick summary: 2025 was slated to be a massive year with the IPO window “blown open” by some accounts. In reality, it barely cracked open — only 6 pure-play software IPOs all year. But M&A came roaring back with $587B in volume, the largest in the...
Yes, M&A is Back. But Confirmed 3x+ Returns Have Collapsed to Just 7% of Deals. Here’s What That Means for Your Exit.
There’s been some epic M&A in the past 12 months. Nvidia paid $20 billion for Groq. Google closed its $32 billion acquisition of Wiz. Google paid $2.4 billion just to hire Windsurf’s CEO and license their tech. Palo Alto Networks is buying CyberArk for...
The Quirky Math Behind M&A Pricing in Tech: Why $125M ARR Can Be Worth $2B+… And Then Disappear
M&A pricing can be a weird thing Meta buys Manus for $2B+ at $125m ARR Then likely … abandons all that revenue. It is a distraction, and in the end, immaterial to Meta’s revenues. Whatever Meta does with it, it likely won’t be investing more in the current product...
Dear SaaStr: When Should You Sell Your Startup?
Dear SaaStr: When Should You Sell Your Startup? Having been through the acquisition process 4x — twice as a founder, twice as a start-up exec, here’s my list of when and if to sell. Don’t take it literally. Most startups never get a single good...
My Biggest Fear in Investing Now: The $100,000,000 ARR Slowdown
So it’s a bit funny, when we started SaaStr we rarely talked about the stage beyond $100m ARR. That’s what it took to go big and IPO. HubSpot, Box, Zendesk, etc. all IPO’d at around that stage. Growing very, very quickly. But around then. Helping you get to $100m...
Figma is at $20B. Right Where Adobe Offered to Buy It. When Is Saying ‘No’ Worth It in A Strong M&A Deal?
Figma is one of the greatest success stories in the history of B2B software. It created and remade its category. It’s worth $18B today, and Adobe almost acquired them for … $20B. But is hasn’t been 100% smooth sailing since the IPO. The stock is down 68% since its...
Yes, The IPO Market Came Back in 2025. But It Still Has a Long Way to Go.
The year started off exciting. IPOs were back, and way up! But the data tells a more nuanced story as we close out the year. The HOT IPO'S of 2025 ATH Peak to today's trough:$CRCL -75%$FIG -75%$BLSH -70%$CRWV -62% — Heisenberg (@Mr_Derivatives)...
When Competitors Come Calling: 6 Questions That Will Help You Make the Right M&A Decision
The SaaStr Framework: 6 Key Questions Every Founder Should Ask When Evaluating M&A Offers A strategic approach to thinking through acquisition opportunities without burning bridges Most successful B2B founders will eventually face this moment: an unexpected call...
Founder SaaStr
Related Posts
