创业者公司出售指南

The Founder’s Guide To Selling Your Company（原文）

For most founders, selling a company is a life changing event that they have had no training for. AtY Combinator, one big thing we help our startups with is navigating questions around the acquisition process. Originally, I wrote this guide for YC startups outlining what I’ve learned in my last ten years as an entrepreneur about selling startups. If you are going through an acquisition, hopefully this will be useful to you.

When to Sell

Similar to raising money, the best time to sell your startup is when you don’t need to or want to. Paradoxically, you are probably thinking about selling your startup as you are experiencing a lack of traction, tough competition, or difficult time fundraising. However, this is a bad time to sell your startup: you will have few bidders and be more likely to acquiesce to the demands of anyone who does show up.

The best time to sell your startup is when you have many options. These options don’t all have to be acquisition offers, they can also be venture term sheets for your next round. You might even be operating profitably and find yourself in the enviable position of confidently being able to turn down an offer. Usually, you will have these options because your startup is actually experiencing great traction; counterintuitively, the best way to “build to flip” is actually the same as building a successful company.

The following is a brief overview of the steps that go into valuing your company, garnering interest in it and navigating through the acquisition process.

Starting Acquisition Talks

Do not enter acquisition talks unless you are ready to sell your company. Negotiating an acquisition is the most distracting thing you can do in a startup: going through M&A is an order of magnitude more distracting than raising money. All of your ability to run the day-to-day operations of your company will grind to a halt. You should only enter an acquisition process if 1) you are certain you want to sell the company and 2) you are likely to get a price you will accept. Don’t talk to potential acquirers “just to see what price you can get.”

How Your Startup Will be Valued

Investors value companies based on either their financial value or their strategic value. A company’s financial value hinges on its profits and model of its future cash flows. For the vast majority of startups in tech, this will be zero. It is much more likely is that your startup will be valued based on where it fits in with the acquiring company’s short or long term strategy. Here are some surprisingly common reasons your startup has strategic value to an acquirer:

• The CEO finds it interesting, or wants to keep it away from another large tech company.
• The executive that runs the relevant division of the acquirer needs to demonstrate “big moves.”
• A competitor to an acquirer is out-executing it in a business and you can help the acquirer become better.
• The acquirer doesn’t have or can’t retain talent in an area where you have employees.
• Your businesses actually have some synergies and combining them is theoretically value-accretive.
• The acquirer is running a similar business but you are executing much better. They are afraid of you.

If some of these reasons seem ridiculous and arbitrary, it is because sometimes they are. Remember that companies are bought, not sold: in order for a company to want to buy you, an internal champion will have to internalize one of these reasons. This isn’t something that can be forced.

When it comes to setting price, there is no “right” price for a company, there is only the price that you can negotiate. Management teams, investment bankers and corporate development people will concoct an array of metrics – like cost per user – to justify a number. Ultimately, though, the clearing price for a startup depends on what the big company can justify to the market (previous comparable acquisitions are a good benchmark) and the sale price agreed to by you and your investors.

A potential acquirer’s first offer is rarely its best offer. Don’t be afraid to say “no” – the potential acquirer isn’t going anywhere. There are many negotiation strategies, but in order to extract the most value you need to (1) be willing to walk away and (2) initiate a competitive bidding process.

Getting Offers

The best way to solicit acquisition offers is to have ongoing conversations with potential acquirers about ways you can work together. These conversations usually involve many different people within a big company; you’ll only get an offer once a sufficiently high-up decision maker is convinced that buying you is a better idea than partnering with you.

When you have an offer, the next thing to do is determine your alternative options. You can do this by letting other potential acquirers (including larger companies you have partnered with and/or competitors to the acquirer) know that you have received a term sheet from an acquirer and you are considering selling yourself, but would prefer a longer term future with their company (find a reason). Now would also be a good time to call up VCs you have been talking to and ask for a term sheet for your next round.

Sometimes, a company you are doing a critical business development partnership with will insist on a “cool down period” in an agreement. This is a period of time during which you have to wait once you’ve received an acquisition offer before you can sign (for your partner to theoretically prepare a better counter offer). Cool down clauses can actually work in your favor as a way to acquire additional offers once you’ve received a first term sheet.

Bullshit Offers

Most of the offers you will receive to buy your startup will be bullshit offers. It costs a company exactly zero dollars to tell you: “we want to buy your startup.” In fact, companies employ teams of people, under the euphemism Corporate Development, to go around the Valley and repeat this phrase to founders.

Bullshit offers are dangerous because they can lull you into a false sense that you are being successful. Like TechCrunch articles, bullshit offers are a vanity metric, not an actual measure of success.

You can tell if an offer is bullshit because it will not be accompanied by an expiration date and/or a promise of a term sheet delivery within a very short period of time (24-48 hours). When a sufficiently high-up decision maker decides he/she wants to buy your startup, he/she will attempt to meet with you constantly and put time pressure on you, so as to prevent you from shopping the deal and getting a better offer. The absence of this behavior indicates the other company is not serious about acquiring your business.

Often the expectations of the founders and corporate development people are very divergent. Before proceeding far into conversations with big acquirers, you should try to clarify valuation expectations (and other important consideration details, like retention packages) as quickly as possible. This strategy should help prevent you from having half a dozen meetings, only to find out the potential acquirer expects to pay $10 million for your rapidly growing startup that already has a term sheet for a $15 million A round.

Hiring a Banker

Like the world of venture capital, investment banking is a field filled with a very small number of extremely well-connected, analytical and experienced people and a much larger number people pretending to be those things. It is unlikely you will be able to find someone in the former category unless your startup’s realistic selling price is in the mid-hundreds of millions or above. But the good news is that you probably don’t need an investment banker at all unless your selling price is that high, and maybe not even then.

Investment bankers are expensive (1 to 2% of the total deal value). However, the good ones can help you get a thorough understanding of the competitive landscape, who the individual decision makers are at every potential acquirer, and what buttons to push to maximize your deal value. Also, the people you are negotiating with in corporate development are professional negotiators: they spend all day every day trying to pay less for target companies. You have probably spent a lot of time doing things that are not negotiating. Having a professional negotiator on your side is often extremely valuable, if you can get someone good.

Pre-Term Sheet Diligence

If you are committed to going through an acquisition process, you should be fairly free with your company data (under an NDA), as it is better that the acquirer uncover any red flags before you’ve signed a term sheet and entered the closing process. However, if the potential acquirer asks to interview your team you should absolutely refuse (unless you are going through a talent acquisition and have no other options). Letting a potential acquirer interview your team is extremely distracting for them, and signals to the acquirer that you are willing to bend over.

Signing a Term Sheet

Once you have collected all your term sheets, you can sign one. Before you do, you should try to negotiate the business and legal points in as much detail as possible. Feel free to push back on exploding offer deadlines and other pressure to sign immediately. After you sign, you can expect any points that weren’t previously negotiated will end up with language in favor of the acquirer.

As the startup, you have all the leverage before you sign a term sheet. Once you sign, you have almost no leverage at all. This is mental: before you sign a term sheet, you haven’t yet decided to sell. Once you do, you have committed to selling the deal to yourself, your employees and investors. Once you get negotiation fatigue - and maybe even before - you will start to agree quickly to things you wouldn’t have considered at the term sheet stage. Also, once you’ve signed a term sheet you can no longer shop your company to other acquirers. If your deal falls apart, other acquirers may have cooled off or think that the deal fell through because your company is damaged goods. It may be impossible to resuscitate your other options.

When negotiating a term sheet, push for a shortest possible closing period (target 30 days) to avoid getting deal fatigue and to put pressure on the acquirer (although, be aware that sometimes a regulatory issue will dictate the timing of the closing and that is outside of everyone’s control). A short closing period will also help you somewhat limit the distraction from your main job: running your startup.

Before you sign a term sheet that commits you to either working at the acquirer or accepting the acquirer’s stock as consideration for the acquisition, ask yourself if you actually believe in the company. The Valley is replete with cautionary tales of startups that sold themselves in exchange for the stock of ultimately worthless acquirers. Don’t let yourself become another one.

Just because you signed a term sheet does not mean your deal is done; in fact, it is very possible that it will still fall apart. Despite a commitment to trying to close, companies change their minds all the time during the diligence process. If your deal fails and the result is that your startup is collateral damage because you were distracted, remember that this is probably an acceptable outcome for the would-have-been acquirer.

Closing

The most dangerous stretch during the acquisition process is the time between when you decide you are going to sell, and when the sale actually occurs. You’ve decided to exchange stress for riches, and you can already see that new house on the horizon (and maybe one for your parents).

What happens when the acquirer comes back and changes the total deal value?

What happens when the acquirer changes its mind, and you have to go back to the grind?

What happens when the acquirer has talked to your senior management, and then decided your team isn’t good enough?

If you are running low on cash, what happens when you run out of cash before the deal closes, because negotiating the deal documents took twice as long as you expected?

These things happen. You should be prepared to walk away from any deal up until the point where you are watching your bank account, waiting for the wire transfer from the acquirer to hit.

Getting to closing is a process largely driven by lawyers. The items to be negotiated are typically divided into legal points and business points - the lawyers will resolve the legal points, but you are expected to figure out the business issues. Remember that you are ultimately responsible for the outcome, and that the lawyers work for you (and usually get paid if the deal happens or not). You have to stay on top of the lawyers to make sure that they aren’t slowing down the deal by getting bogged down in details that don’t actually make any difference to you or your stakeholders.

In Summary

Entering the acquisition process is one of the most dangerous things an early stage startup can do, because the process is distracting, demoralizing, and usually involves giving your competition most of your proprietary business data. Founders who have been through the process have said it is ten times as distracting as fundraising. It often cripples your ability to oversee the business operations. Do not enter into an acquisition process lightly.

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Carolyn Levy, Jon Levy and Emmett Shear helped contribute to and edit this post. Thanks!

Disagree with anything I’ve posted? Let me know on Twitter.

译文

                                                                               创业者公司出售指南
        对于大多数创业者来说，出售自己的公司是一件未经培训的的但是能够改变人生轨迹的事情。
     在Y Combinator ，我们主要帮助那些初创公司在收购过程中解决各种问题。起初，我为YC初创公司写的这个指南
     概述了我作为企业家在过去十年中学到的关于出售公司的一切。假如你也正要出售公司，那么希望本文能帮到你。
        
     什么时候出售
        
       跟筹款类似，出售公司的最佳时机是你不需要或者不想出售的时刻。而不是，当你处于失去干劲，面对激烈竞争
     或者资金困难的时刻；然而，这是最坏的出售时机。这时候收购者少，很有可能你会答应任何有兴趣收购你的公
     司的人的任何条件 。
           最佳时机就是当你还掌握许多选择选项。这些选项不一定都是收购邀约，也可能是下一轮的风险投资。你
     可能处于有利地位并且手握收购的一票否决权。通常情况下，你拥有那么选择是因为你的公司正朝好的方向发展。
     完成咸鱼反身的最佳方法和创立一个成功的公司是一样。
    
     以下是评估公司，吸引投资和完成收购几个步骤的简短的概述。
    
     开启收购谈话
    
        除非你准备好要出售公司再接受收购邀约。收购的协商事宜是收购开始阶段最烦人的事，经历企业并购比筹资更、、
    恼人。你对公司的日常经营能力将会慢慢的耗竭。此刻假如你想要出售公司或者你能够得到一笔你能接受的收购资金
    于是你才应该接受收购。不要为了只是想看看你能得到什么样的报价而跟潜在的收购者谈判。
    
     你的公司会被如何的评估
    
     投资者会依据目前的财务情况以及投资策略来评估你的公司。公司的财务状况取决于盈利状况以及资金流的稳健状态。
     对于大多数科技公司，这项指标会是0.投资方更加倾向于评估公司的获利点以及对于投资方自己公司的长远策略角度
     以下是一些出你的公司对于收购者有战略价值的出人意料的常见情形：
        CEO觉得有趣或者想要避开其他的大型科技公司
        收购决策者需要大的功绩
        收购者的一个竞争对手本次收购出局了而你能够帮助收购者变得更好    
        你拥有收购者所没有的某方面的人才
        你们有业务合作，合并能使业务增值
        收购方也经营相似业务，但是你们公司更加出色
     假如以上理由看起来很荒谬、武断，因为这只是某些情形下的情况，记住：公司是有人主动购买而不是为了让其他
     公司愿意购买而被动出售，一个内在的冠军会把这些理由内在化。这不是一些被强制的事情。
        当公司被标价时，没有正确的价格，只有一个协商价位。管理团队，投资顾问以及联合创始人会制定一些列
      的尺度，像每位用户的话费的计量单位来证明一个数字是合理的。然而，公司的一个明确的价格主要取决于
      这家公司能够向市场证明什么（以前的相似收购将会是一个很好的基准），最终的价格由你和你的投资者协商决定。      
         一个潜在收购者的首次报价是低于最佳价格的。不要害怕说不。收购者不会因此而吓跑。还可以有许多协商的
      方法。为了获得最大的价值，对于低价收购，你可以置之不理，然后让那些收购者竞争。价高者得之。        
      
      获得收购机会
      
          征求收购的最好的方式是与潜在收购者们会面商讨你们能展开哪些合作。这种会议最好邀请那些有大公司的老板。
      你只有让他们信服，收购会比合作更有商业价值才能使那些决策者给你一纸收购邀约。      
           当你拥有收购邀约的时候，你就可以考虑其他的选项，获得某家公司的邀约能使其他潜在的收购者闻风而动。
      你需要让那些公司知道你获得了某家公司的报价，并准备出售自己的公司，并且会跟那些公司保持长远的合作关系。
      这也是跟你的风投会谈考虑下一轮融资的最佳时机。
           有时候，与你有重要业务合作的公司会一致的保持一个冷却期。这时候，一旦你获得了收购邀约你必须等待
       一段时间在签合同（有可能的你的合作伙伴会提出更丰厚的合同）。一旦你获得了第一次的融资，你就能在冷却
       条款中有发言权，有权要求额外的开价机会。
        
       胡乱的开价
       
           你收到的大多数收购邀约都是胡乱开价的。一个公司表明要收购你的公司完全不花费什么代价。事实上，
       公司的人力资源团队，以共同发展为委婉说辞，并到处游走，向创始人们重复这套说辞，谋求尽可能低的报价。
           胡乱报价是危险的，因为这可能会误导你，让你认为自己还是赚到的。就像TechCrunch提到的，胡乱报价
       是一种错误的标价，算不上是真正的成功。
           你能分辨这点，因为通常不会伴随一个期限或者是一个短期的投资条款的承诺。当一个精明的决策者决定要收
       购你的公司时，他会不时的和你接触并且给你时间限制，以此来防止你毁约或者要求更高的报价。如果没有这些
       手段，则表明那些公司并不是诚心想收购你的公司。
          通常投资人和联合创始人之间的期望是有分歧的。在与一个大老板深入合作事宜钱，你应该与你的合作伙
       伴澄清期望价格以及其他重要的细节。这些步骤能够帮你挽回潜在的一半损失，比如给你的快速发展的公司
       开价1000万而事实上你的第一轮融资就已经到达1500万了。

       雇佣一个投资顾问

           就像风险投资界一样，投资顾问中也有一小批极赋热心，分析能力以及经验的人。很多人都倾向于向
       他们投身于其中。你不太可能在风投中找到太多的帮助，除非你的公司估值非常高。但是如果你的公司估值真的
       那么高，那你根本不需要投资顾问的支持。
           投资顾问是很昂贵的（他们会收取总交易额的1-2%的佣金）。然后好的投资顾问能够很好的理解收购过程
       的发展趋势，并能够在恰当的时间提出最大化价值的交易时机。想要收购的这些人都是职业的谈判专家。他们
       的工作就是想尽办法减少支出。你们可能在很长一段时间内都无法达成一致。假如你有钱，雇佣一个投资顾问
       是很划算的。       
            
        签署投资条款前
        
            假如你已经决定了收购，你应该对于你的公司的数据在保密协议下开放。在你签合同签完成收购前让投、
       资方知道你们公司的会计预警信号总不是一件明智的事情，然而，假如收购方要求与你的团队会面，你应该完全拒绝
       （除非你们进行的是人才并购或者别无办法）。让投资方见你的团队是一个在谈判中你可能会妥协的信号。
       
        签署投资条款
           
           一旦你们已经就合作协议达成共识，就能签署投资条款了。在你签署前，你应该尽可能在业务和法律的细节上
         再三斟酌，一面出现纰漏。必要时勇敢地推翻交易截止日期以及任何签署协议的其他压力。签完协议后，你要
         预期投资方以任何先前没有考虑好的条款为理由来终止这次收购。
            作为新兴公司，签合同签前，你有优势，一旦签署，你就没有优势了。谨记，没签协议签，你还没下决心
         出售。一旦你签了，你就已经卖了你自己，你的员工，你的投资伙伴的经营权。一旦你对协商感到疲乏。可能是
         很早之前，你就可能接受了原来你没有考虑到的条款。如果你签了条款，你不能再出售给其他公司。一旦本次
         收购失败，其他投资方就会变得冷淡或者认为这笔交易不能成功。因为你的公司是残缺次品（是别人捡剩下的
         或者不要的）。这将使你放弃了其他的选择机会。
              当协商投资条款时，力争一个短期的截止日期（目标是30天），以避免谈判疲乏，把压力转加给收购方。
         （注意，有时候公司的监管权问题可能会延长谈判周期，然后超出任何人的支配范围）短期截止时间也可以减少
         你的注意力，你可以更多的投入到经营你自己的公司。
             在签协议，决定你是否为投资方工作或者接受投资方股票之前，你需要清除你是否信任公司。历史上，有tai
        多的创业家接受了收购方的股票。而最后变成了毫无价值的股票.注意前车之鉴。
            仅仅签署协议并不意味着你们的交易就完成了。事实上，还以可能发生交易失败的情形，尽管已经承诺了
        完成此次交易，在协议正式生效前，投资家们仍然可能放弃此次收购。假如交易失败，你的公司会遭受担保损失
        。因为你已经分心了。记住准备好一切可能发生的心理准备。
        
        交易截止
        
         在收购过程汇总最危险的时段是在你决定你将要出售与交易真正发生之间的这段时间。你已经决定将你的辛劳换成
       财富，你已经预见了眼前的自己买的大房子（或者给你父母的）。
         假如这时候收购者回来改变了交易的成交价格怎么办？
         假如收购者改变主意，你不得不重新回到谈判的拉锯战怎么办？
         假如收购者跟你的高级管理人会面，然后说你的团队不符合他们的预期怎么办？
         假如你的资金链紧缺，恰好在交易截止前，因为协商花费的时间是你预期的两倍，时间不断延长，这时资金链断裂
      怎么办?              
          这些事有可能发生，你应该准备好从交易中脱身直到你正看着你的账户，等着资金转入账户。
           截止交易主要受到律师的影响。协商的条目主要分为法律方面和商业业务方面的，律师会解决法律方面的，然后你
       你需要解决业务方面的。记住你要对结果负责，律师为你工作（收取报酬）。你要注意律师不会对实际不会对你和你
       的持股者产生实质影响的细节产生懈怠。

       总结
       
         收购是一个初创公司的早期阶段最危险的事情之一，因为你会因此分心，导致士气低落并且会使你的竞争对手了解到
      你们公司的一些商业专利数据。经历过这个阶段的创业这都说这是一个与筹款相比10倍让人分心的。它通常会影响你对
      公司的监管能力。不到万不得已，不要轻易进行收购。
      
      Carolyn Levy, Jon Levy and Emmett Shear 帮助修正、校对了这篇文章. 感谢!
      如果对于我的文章有任何不同的意见或者建议，请在推特上和我交流。
      
      
     acquisition :获得;购置物;获得物;收购;
     originally:起初，原来;独创地，独出心裁地;
     outlining ：概述，列提纲；
     entrepreneur：法企业家；
     startup:启动;新兴公司（尤指新兴网络公司）;
     paradoxically:adv.反论; 荒谬; 自相矛盾;
     fundraising：筹款，募款
     bidders ：投标人
     enviable ：值得羡慕的;引起妒忌的
     counterintuitively：违反直觉的
     M&A（Mergers and Acquisitions ）：即企业并购
     magnitude ：n.巨大，广大;重大，重要;量级
     grind ：磨碎，嚼碎;折磨
     hinge on：取决于…
     justify ：证明…有理;为…辩护；
     solicit：恳求;征求;提起
     euphemism ：委婉语;委婉说法;
     lull：使镇静，使安静;哄，哄骗;使入睡
     divergent ：有分歧的;叉开的;
     Diligence：勤勉，勤奋
     fatigue ：疲劳，疲乏;劳务杂役
     cool off ：变凉;凉一凉
     resuscitate ：使复苏;使复兴
     regulatory ：调整的;具有监管权的，监管的
     replete ：饱食的;充满的，供应充足的
     stretch ；伸展;弹性;一片;一段时间
     walk away from ：从…走开;口比赛中轻而易举地胜过（某人或某物）;安然脱身
     bogged ：陷于泥沼的
     demoralizing：使丧失信心的，令人泄气的
     proprietary：专利的;所有（人）的;（商品）专卖的
     cripple：使跛;受伤致残;严重削弱;使陷于瘫痪
     oversee ：监督，监视;俯瞰;错过，宽恕，省略