This is an aspect of the Wordpress vs WPEngine I hadn’t considered. Does anyone who’s more familiar with WPEngine than me know if the VC ownership has affected its behavior?
Silver Lake (the owner of WPEngine) is a PE, not a VC.
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PEs tend to target investments in mature companies instead of early stage to growth stages companies.
It's just another form of capital for companies that have decided to stay private, or wish to return to private ownership.
Oftentimes, if leadership makes the choice to do one or the other, that means the company isn't doing as hot, because until recently, listing publicly and raising capital on a strong listing was fairly doable.
That said, imo this does lead to a bit of a bias about the outcomes of PE ownership, because if you are choosing PE ownership, that often means investors and potentially even leadership just want an exit and don't care as much about the underlying product anymore.
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PEs tend to target investments in mature companies instead of early stage to growth stages companies.
It's just another form of capital for companies that have decided to stay private, or wish to return to private ownership.
Oftentimes, if leadership makes the choice to do one or the other, that means the company isn't doing as hot, because until recently, listing publicly and raising capital on a strong listing was fairly doable.
That said, imo this does lead to a bit of a bias about the outcomes of PE ownership, because if you are choosing PE ownership, that often means investors and potentially even leadership just want an exit and don't care as much about the underlying product anymore.