Jun
7
Bittersweet: They Sold My Company
June 7, 2005 | Comments Off
Bittersweet day. My heart sorrows. My pocket is full of happiness.
Today is the official date when a larger company (15,000+ employees) acquires the medium size company for which I work (750+ employees). I saw my company grow from when it was less than a 100 employees, pre IPO (Initial Public Offering into the stock market) and was making just about 10 Million a year. I saw it grow to a 150 Million a year company just to be merged. I did spent 8 years of my career helping it grow.
And I call it MY company because I still hold stocks from it (which will be paid with a cash tender in the next few weeks). I still have a portion of it that I will no longer have.
Want to know how I could be happy as well as sad?
Professionally it is a sad day, full of reflexions. My job future is uncertain, as an equivalent position has not been identified on the new company (we could not talk about that until the merger occurred).
Some of the effort I have put over the years, and some of the technologies I have helped create will not be used by the new company. Some of the technological things I learned will not be required any more.
Monetarily it is a great thing! I am an owner of the Company. I am entitled to more money than I invested into it. The stock dramatically appreciated the day the acquisition was announced. Between the stocks accumulated through the Employee Stock Purchase Program, and some stock options that where exercisable but held for a while I have made more money in a single day than what I will be making for the rest of the year. All of it goes straight into my
investment accounts, making my net worth soar.
Just another example of how Owning a company (or a portion of it) is better than Working for it.
Note: I do plan to continue working on this bigger company, just to see how it goes. Hopefully it will be full of opportunities. Otherwise, I will have to look for better ones elsewhere. The job future is unknown. My financial future is roughly mapped out.
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