[mikeryan]

How much has doing the startup cost you. If you're bootstrapped you've probably both put personal funds in as well as a salary opportunity costs.

Thats your base.

Now you need to find a multiplier for the opportunity you're giving up. Have fun with it. Say you'd think you could sell your company in 2 years for $20M. Say there's a 10% chance of that happening. That $2M. Divide that by number of founders/employees. There's your markup. Maybe you add some padding to leave room for negotiation.

At the end of the day you need to also find some sort of bottom line. How much are you willing to take to give up to take a normal job (noting you're probably locked in for a year or two)? With my business it's enough to pay off my house. Thats the least amount I'd take to sell my business (not a startup, bootstrapped services)

[biot]

  > How much has doing the startup cost you. If you're
  > bootstrapped you've probably both put personal funds in as
  > well as a salary opportunity costs. Thats your base.

This is irrelevant. If you've blown $50M of your personal funds on a startup with nothing to show for it why would it be up to the acquiring company to have $50M as the floor price so that your losses are covered? If you bought a used car, would the base price incude the cost of gas that the seller spent?

It boils down to some combination of three things: people acquisition costs, domain expertise value, and technology worth. There's a fourth factor of inherent value of the business itself (outside of technology and people), but the OP stated they have neither revenue nor customers so that's likely a zero. All these are values that the acquiring company can put a number on. Price accordingly.

[petercooper]

How much are you willing to take to give up to take a normal job (noting you're probably locked in for a year or two)?

This is very important if your company is already making money/providing you with a salary/dividends.

You're not just being acquihired, but you're essentially losing control of an asset that makes you money. In the wrong circumstances, you could be hired, fired within months, and have no income, so the acquisition needs to be enough to cover thriving through that worst case.