Actually, since the servers themselves are physical assets with a useful life, and indeed could be leased independently from the business model during that useful life, they'd be modeled as depreciation not amortization. But yes, EBITDA would be increased either way.
Realistically, the valuation multiples on EBITDA for mature SaaS businesses are different from those for datacenter operators, and someone building a financial model for Dropbox would now likely take a blend of these this into consideration. So EBITDA is by no means the end-all be-all here.
EDIT: And taxation is a different story altogether, as in either the cloud or own-hardware case, Dropbox can write off expenses or depreciation respectively.
Good point. I always wonder how such accounting changes truly reflect the financial performance of the company. On one hand it's a lot of upfront cost to Dropbox with high risk too but all that won't show up completely if this cost is amortizable over the long run.
Nearly every company does that. It's amazing how little many companies actually own. I've worked in offices where everything from building over furniture to even the plants was leased. The company ran with close to zero assets (services business). Pretty sure that this wouldn't make any sense if it wasn't for tax purposes.
Realistically, the valuation multiples on EBITDA for mature SaaS businesses are different from those for datacenter operators, and someone building a financial model for Dropbox would now likely take a blend of these this into consideration. So EBITDA is by no means the end-all be-all here.
EDIT: And taxation is a different story altogether, as in either the cloud or own-hardware case, Dropbox can write off expenses or depreciation respectively.