Skype's $6.6B Flip
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A story about how Egan Durbin and Silver Lake turned around Skype through a successful acquisition and sale.
"He partners with a16z and buys Skype for $1.9 billion. People were saying it's hard to turn a technology company around, it's on the decline, it's riddled with lawsuits, this is a messy buy.
He goes in and says 'We're going to do two things: we're going to hire a great CEO, settle all these lawsuits, and invest in making our product better because the product's just been atrophying for so long.'
He immediately settles the lawsuits, hires a great CEO, starts investing in the product, and in 18 months he sells the thing all cash to Microsoft for $8.5 billion. He basically triples their money on a billion dollar base principle amount and immediately makes a name for himself."
Shaan Puri
Host of MFM
Shaan Puri is the Chairman and Co-Founder of The Milk Road. He previously worked at Twitch as a Senior Director of Product, Mobile Gaming, and Emerging Markets. He also attended Duke University.