Instead of IPOs and acquisitions, exiting to community is one alternative

What if there were another way? What if a startup that successfully builds a community could opt for an exit to ownership by that community?

In the coming months, I will be exploring strategies and stories that could help create a new option for startups: Exit to community. In E2C, the company would transition from investor ownership to ownership by the people who rely on it most. Those people might be users, workers, customers, participant organizations, or a combination of such stakeh... See more

When a startup exits to community, founders should see enough of a reward that they feel their risk and hard work was worth it. Investors should see a fair return for their risk. Most importantly, the key stakeholders should know the company is worthy of their trust and ongoing investment because they co-own it. For a social-media company, this mig... See more

Usually, the exit is when the startup gets sold to a bigger, generally more boring company, or when it “goes public” on a stock market and pieces of it get passed among countless buyers and sellers. That’s when investors, along with founders and early employees, get their payday. But for startups that build communities—of users, or workers, or whom... See more

This is not so crazy. The more I look, the more I find activists, lawyers, investors and entrepreneurs around the world who are exploring options along these lines, often while seeking to address some of the deep problems of internet culture. Community ownership could be a way of rooting out the abuses that we often see with the billion-dollar “uni... See more

If you’re forming a startup, there are generally two kinds of stories to choose from about what the startup is for. Keep in mind that startups are companies that are trying to take over some subsection of the world. It’s ambitious stuff, so they tend to take on lots of early investment. They get somebody to give them a lot of money so they can hit ... See more