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by cookiecaper 5453 days ago
It's funny that places like Google even perform talent acquisitions. I guess when you're controlling billions of dollars a few million here or there is a comparative "drop in the bucket" but it really has to be about covetousness or something, because there is a large supply of talented engineers that would be willing to work at Google as normal employees, and certainly many of these would have the same capabilities as the Frid.ge team. Does it really cost anything close $5M-$10M to find a handful of employees with that skillset? I'd say Google is definitely doing it wrong if so -- I can understand a premium for demonstrating competency with something like Frid.ge, but it just seems quite inflated when all Google ends up with in the end is a few employees for a few years (if that). I have to say I'm pretty skeptical that talent acquisitions are a decent deal from the acquirer's side of things.

No offense or displeasure to the Frid.ge team of course, if they're happy with it that's fine. I just don't see it as an economically effective investment from Google's end. Perhaps part of it is the extra headlines that are inevitable when a YC company gets acquired? Just doesn't seem like a good value to me.
1 comments
roc 5453 days ago
How much would Google have to spend to hire a complete team to add and expand fridge-like features for Google+? It's got to be in that same ballpark.

Surely it's worth the premium to hire a cohesive, motivated team that's already learned the domain and has a proven ability to execute.

Particularly considering the benefit Google can realize from getting a better solution to market faster.

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cookiecaper 5453 days ago
Why would it be in that same ballpark? Google has a notoriously silly hiring process so its costs are probably higher than the costs of some other companies, but really 5-10MM to hire 3-4 people? I guess if they're willing to spend that on a "talent acquisition" it may not be that far out of line with normal hiring costs but I'd say there's certainly a problem there.

As I stated in my post I understand that demonstrating ability via Frid.ge can certainly be valuable and worth a premium. It just seems to be much higher than one might expect Google to spend on normal hiring processes.

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roc 5453 days ago
I think the part of the equation that we're weighting differently is the value to Google of having better features for Google+, available sooner.

I'd join you in surprise if we weren't talking about Google Plus.

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