He sold the company for $1.6bn, but he had a 10% stake. So his stake was worth $160m. He kept $100m. So he gave away $60m.
He did not give away a billion dollars. The article headline and the article itself is written in such a way that it arguably obscures the facts and confuses.
It’s great he gave away $60m but it’s got little to nothing to do with his opinion that he doesn’t believe in billionaires; including that in the headline makes it seem like he gave away a billion dollars.
Thats fucked up, why sell it? Give it back to the workers.
Sell it, keep $100M, distribute $1,500M to the employees who built the company with you.
…sit on the beach with your former employees as just people, discussing who has the cutest little umbrella in their drink and laughing at the stock value of the global conglomerate that bought a business that no longer has employees.
No, just distribute ownership amongst the workers. Keep a majority share if youre worried they arent responsible enough.
I guess it just depends on the scope. Since we were talking about giving way over a billion, I was envisioning the employees being set for life and having no concern for the continued operation of the business.
If we’re talking about thousands of people, then I guess either option is pretty sweet. Either you keep your same job but now have equity and control, or you keep your same job under new ownership but see an extra $500,000 cash just drop into your checking account.
I took a look at the article and I got no impression of the employee count, but the dude who sold the company seems like the rare ultra-rich startup CEO business owner who is somehow based as fuck.
It sounds like starting companies is just what he likes doing, and/or is driven to do. I have to admit I’m a little jealous because imagine being a decent person, and first being told you have no rent or bills ever again, and then being given 1,500 Million Dollars to just give to people and causes you care about. That would be off-the-charts fun and rewarding.
(edit to add: the article may have been written in a misleading way such that he gave away less than half the money rather than over 90%, so maybe he’s not quite so based. Still way ahead of the pack. Something I have often said is that in order to become a billionaire, you have to be the kind of person who can have $100M and still put in overtime because you aren’t satisfied. It sounds like this guy at least works because he wants to and is thinking in the right direction)
Article snippet:
The 48-year-old is now building his third startup, a supply-chain emissions data company called Scope3. Still, he claims you’ll never catch him joining the billionaires club. “I will never be that wealthy. Even if Scope3 is immensely successful, we will give that money away.”
Just seems sick to build a company off the backs of your employees then say, “you know what take the equity and spend it elsewhere who cares about the people who got me here. They have been gifted a job like the good servants they are.”
yea well trying to increase your wealth to billions is pretty much an addiction much akin to gambling addiction.
That’s stupid to just “give it away” because there are so many unsolved problems in the world you’d think they’d use it to start another company which improves recycling rates or invest in nuclear power.
You might want to actually read the first sentence of the article before posting… Jus sayin’
“Brian O’Kelley banked less than $100 million after selling his $1.6 billion startup AppNexus to AT&T—and gave the rest to charity.”
What are you on about?
Give it away is cool af.
He’s not wrong. Being circled by scavengars like some kind of dying leviathan is not a sane way to live.
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Well that’s certainly nicer than how the French handled it
I’ve said stuff like that before, but I bet we can do even better. You don’t just tax the extra money they make and be done. You publicize the great things the money does, and you give the people awards, titles, and attention in whatever way seems effective.
So maybe next year AWS keeps growing like crazy and Jeff Bezos’s yearly “donation” is like 30 Billion dollars. He never sees that money, yet he still lives a billionaire lifestyle. The government uses that money to have schools offer every child in the country three hot nutritious meals per day, and some hallway in DC gets a plaque that says Jeff Bezos: Savior of the Children and the Future of American Brainpower. We all win in the ways we care about.
If it’s ok for companies to psychologically manipulate and/or physically harm people in pursuit of profit, then it’s ok for we the people to use the bottomless narcissism and ambition of the CEO class as an energy source.
There’s nothing wrong with billionaires in themselves, that’d be stupid. A billion’s js a number slowly losing it’s value as time goes on. It’s how the money’s acquired that matters.
A lot and overwhelming amt of billionaires in places like america make their money thru fistfucking their entire country and the destruction of society, but they don’t notice money’s just a number, a value and once that society’s destroyed you can’t eat money. Like I said nothing wrong with making money but it depends on how you make it.
Soft disagree. I think even numerical wealth past a certain number is a sign of, at best, incoherent markets.
Most billionaires make their money from coming out of the right womb.
Which is why inheritance tax is a thing even tho most find ways to avoid it.
As long as they pay their dues, instead of leaving us plebs to run their own state for them, which granted a lot of them don’t, idrc. I want to make P’s as much as anyone else but if the game’s rigged against my favour we need to change the game.
Same way how in sport people win and lose, that’s not the issue, but the game has to be fair, we can’t allow doping, the playing field has to be even.
You are aware that the billionaires don’t pay any tax at all and keep it in panama? You want to change the game, be contrary to some other opinion than billionaires being an insane plague (yes themselves)
How many more people/companies do we need to see doing this before we see change?
I am praising the action not the individual :)
Oh. I thought this was The Onion for a second when I saw the title.
why didn’t he pay a bunch of that to the employees?
Because that’s against how the system works. Shareholders can and will sue your company if you don’t maximise profits. I honestly do not believe that we will achieve an acceptable distribution of wealth under capitalism.
That’s a certainty as equitable distribution of wealth is diametrically opposed to the fundamental working of the capitalist system.
Should have shared the money with the workers who built the company into a $1.6B valuation and worth acquisition.
Jesus Christ, it’s never good enough for you, why even bother trying.
That’s correct, there’s no way to be the good guy in a system like this. All you can do is try
Just because he gave it away, doesn’t remove his responsibility for how he “earned” it.
Look, at least he does not seem to have raped anyone.
That’s a low bar.
At least there is a bar
I agree, but it doesn’t sound like his choices are bad. There’s a comment further down.
…by working hard for it?
He didn’t work hard for it, his underpaid employees did. He just sold their hard work and kept the exorbitant profit.
At the end of the day, stolen wages are still stolen wages.
Lol, i know, right?
So many upvotes for the guy above you defending billionaires
If anything he should have invested it into effecting political change. But that other person is right; it’s never good enough for you.
In Russia that’s an oligarchy. Yet here you are advocating it?
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
I’m not advocating for the system. I’m just suggesting a way the money could do the greatest good.
Money can buy political change. That shouldn’t be true, but it is.
If you’re so hungry for a target to be mad at that you imagine them like this, maybe it’s time to take a little break.
Good for him tbh, being a billionare WILL slowly corrode your mind and soul
Sounds good
Put it in the bank and live off the interest
If only he believed in himself, he could have been a billionaire…
Just a general reminder to anyone to use a site like Charity Navigator to find good causes to donate to.
or GiveWell if you want causes ranked according to their impact as measured in QALYs. They research these things pretty carefully to determine the impact. If you’re not a utilitarian then you may not see the point of doing this (though on the other hand, if you’re not a utilitarian, I don’t know if there’s any way to evaluate charities well.)
