But how are the chances of an exit with a company of that scale?
How big is the market for "niche" companies being acquired for USD 50m, if it was bootstrapped? It seems that there are a lot of acquisitions or acquihires in that range if you are VC funded and are working on innovative tech that makes sense for bigger companies to acquire. But if you are focusing on revenue/profits, and lets say you get to $6-$10m usd in revenue, who are gonna buy you? And an IPO doesn't seem factible since you are not big enough. And if you are outside USA its even a harder sell.
I guess it could happen that a lot of transactions of "niche" companies exists in that price range but they are not publicized by journalism because they lack relevance, and that would give you a biased perspective of lower sales of companies, but I wouldn't be that sure of that hypothesis.
So, what do you think about the odds of exits strategies for a $30-50m bootstrapped startup?
If you are profitable, there are a truckload of people that will want to buy you. Private equity, other companies, holding companies.
Look at it this way - say I'm super wealthy and I have $100M sitting in my bank account. It earns a tiny interest rate at the bank. Where can I put it to work for me so that it's growing? One option is to buy a company for $100M. For $100M I can buy a company that produces $10M/year in profit (roughly speaking). Now I'm earning a 10% annual return on my investment. I might even be able to grow the company, so when I sell it 5 years later, I sell it for $200M. So I've taken my $100M and turned it in to $250M.
That's the great thing about profitable companies. There is almost always a buyer.
How big is the market for "niche" companies being acquired for USD 50m, if it was bootstrapped? It seems that there are a lot of acquisitions or acquihires in that range if you are VC funded and are working on innovative tech that makes sense for bigger companies to acquire. But if you are focusing on revenue/profits, and lets say you get to $6-$10m usd in revenue, who are gonna buy you? And an IPO doesn't seem factible since you are not big enough. And if you are outside USA its even a harder sell. I guess it could happen that a lot of transactions of "niche" companies exists in that price range but they are not publicized by journalism because they lack relevance, and that would give you a biased perspective of lower sales of companies, but I wouldn't be that sure of that hypothesis. So, what do you think about the odds of exits strategies for a $30-50m bootstrapped startup?