It was just past midnight after a tense day in late March of 2014, and Brendan Iribe’s emotions were raw as he fired off an email to his closest advisors. Iribe, the 37-year-old co-founder and former CEO of Oculus VR, had just gotten off the phone with Mark Zuckerberg, the 32-year-old cofounder and CEO of Facebook. The two young entrepreneurs were on the verge of sealing a blockbuster deal that would shock the tech industry. The world’s largest social network would buy the world’s hottest virtual reality startup. But with just hours to go, the two couldn’t agree on how the purchase price, based on the value of Facebook’s stock, would be spun. Iribe was adamant that it be called a $2 billion-acquisition, but the math, tied to Facebook’s dipping stock price, didn’t quite add up. The deal was suddenly on life support.
Oculus and its headset, the Rift, were already the toast of the tech world, and Iribe had some of the industry’s biggest names on speed dial. Marc Andreessen was on his board, and Founders Fund, co-founded by Peter Thiel, was an investor. But it wasn’t either one who answered Iribe. It was Thiel’s colleague Brian Singerman, a 40-year-old software geek and one of the newest partners at the firm. By 1 am, with Singerman’s help, Iribe had tweaked the announcement so it would make the Oculus team happy without forcing Facebook to renegotiate terms. Hours later, Facebook announced in a press release that it was buying Oculus for “approximately $2 billion” in cash and stock and $300 million in employee earn-outs. For investors in the two-year-old startup, it was a golden outcome, but Singerman, who had salvaged the deal, was kicking himself. “I was the first investor to commit to them,” he says. “But we could have owned so much more.”
Denne historien er fra May 12, 2017-utgaven av Forbes India.
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Denne historien er fra May 12, 2017-utgaven av Forbes India.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Home-Cooked Meal Is Now Greatly Valued
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Paytm 3.0 - Reaching Near Breakeven In Two Years
As of 2020, Vijay Shekhar Sharma’s super app for financial services had run up losses in thousands of crores. Now, as digital payments gets yet another boost courtesy Covid-19, he’s hopeful of reaching near breakeven in two years
THE PANDEMIC HAS CAUSED WOMEN GREATER LABOUR PAIN
Covid-19 has shown that women are more likely to face the brunt of job losses than men, and find fewer opportunities when they want to resume. That apart, several have to deal with increased hours of unpaid work at home and even domestic abuse
LEADERSHIP WILL BE ABOUT SEEING THE BIGGER PICTURE
Leaders must not only guard their teams first during a crisis, but also deal with stakeholders with respect and dignity. And apart from pursuing business goals, they should remain committed to our planet and the environment
PHILANTHROPY SHOULD BE HUMBLE, BUT NOT MODEST
Apart from building a flexible and resilient framework for the future, philanthropists, civil society and the government must work in tandem so that every rupee is absorbed on the ground
INTEGRATED HEALTH CARE, TECH WILL DISRUPT SECTOR
While clinical research will get a boost, having a skilled workforce and public spending on health care will be challenges in the near term
DIGITALISATION WILL HELP IN VALUE CREATION
As the pandemic brings technology and innovation to the core of business and daily life, the next decade will see about 150 million digital-first families in India
Industry 4.0: Climate Revolution?
Augmenting sustainability alongside digital capabilities is an economic, competitive and global opportunity for India’s businesses, but regulations need to reflect intent
EV Dream Still Miles Away
Electric vehicles have remained a buzzword in India for years. But not much has moved on ground due to high upfront costs, range anxiety and charging infrastructure
Living Waters
A virus has caused us to scramble for oxygen but our chokehold on the environment is slowly strangling the very waters that breathe life into us. The virus is a timely reminder: We are merely consumers, not producers of life’s breath on this planet
