[renewiltord]

Jetbrains is a bootstrapped superstar company, man. They don't have to answer to people like you and me. For the rest:

1. LinkedIn -> public through MSFT

2. Stack Overflow -> public through PROSY

3. Meta -> public

4. Epic -> public through TCEHY

If you want to solve this problem, start a blindingly successful company with wild ARR and then spend it how you want it to. But if you take it public, you best believe that you now have masters that look like you and me. Notice how employee ratings of CEOs correlates strongly to stock performance? That's what shareholders do too. No one knows what's right. They only know the outcome they like, not how to get there.

Personally, I think this is fantastic. They're doing a good job moving the frontier of some of this marketing stuff. That means a pretty good internal org structure that allows the eng guys to contribute to the branding stuff.

[awesomeMilou]

> start a blindingly successful company with wild ARR and then spend it how you want it to.

So you mean actually innovating in the space that your products occupy and become market leader there? Maybe in a niche that no one occupied before?

IDE's before JetBrains were complete ass-backwards, no wonder they're so successful.

> That's what shareholders do too. No one knows what's right. They only know the outcome they like, not how to get there.

Maybe don't start out trying to build a product that requires an instant 10 million dollars in cash injection? Before the recession there were YC backed startups on here that offered products that hat no market fit outside the silicon valley bubble.

[renewiltord]

TSMC started with $58 M at $200 M valuation in the late 1980s. I think it’s like 15% annual growth rate since then and the centerpiece of a nation’s geopolitical doctrine. You can build rocket ships in many different ways. You get all sorts of outcomes.

No one really knows outcome till they give it a shot. People used to make fun of the idea of a software guy building spaceships and cars and he’s doing it better than the incumbents. No one knows what will work till it’s done.

[awesomeMilou]

TSMC wasn't bootstrapped in the stricter sense though. Those 58$ million came from Phillips, who also provided the technology and skill transfer for their first manufacturing process.

> People used to make fun of the idea of a software guy building spaceships and cars and he’s doing it better than the incumbents.

Reducing the success of SpaceX to Elon Musks persona alone is, realistically speaking, delusional at best. But everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

[renewiltord]

Exactly. TSMC wasn’t bootstrapped. It’s okay to build products that require a large amount of capital to start. Many of them are very successful.

As for Elon Musk. Many had access to the labour pool that he did. Many tried to do what his companies did. His companies succeeded. Once could be chance, twice is skill. But to each their own.

[jatins]

> start a blindingly successful company with wild ARR

What is Jetbrains estimated ARR?

[renewiltord]

It was on HN a while ago though I don’t remember the source. It was 250 M pre-pandemic almost all recurring or something like that going off memory. Founders owned the whole thing.