Acquired cozies up to the fire and looks back on the year in tech. How wildly off were we on last year's predictions? What does the next year have in store? Most importantly, what price will Bitcoin be trading at in December 2018??? Pour yourself a glass of your favorite holiday beverage and kick back with us.

Acquired crosses the half-century mark with an instant classic: Apple's 2014 purchase of Beats, its largest acquisition ever. If you knew Beats as just another headphone company, think again—the history on this one will keep your heads ringin'.

Ben and David dive into the most talked-about tech IPO of 4Q 2017: Stitch Fix. After downsizing the offering and pricing below the range, does this signal a warning that public markets won't value high-flying silicon valley "disruptors" as high as VCs hope? Or is this a textbook example of a great return for a disciplined management team and well-run company? Most importantly, what happens next? Tune in for our heroes' take.

Ben & David cover the proposed largest tech M&A deal of all time, and in the process dive into the evolving dynamics of the industry that started everything in Silicon Valley—silicon. Just when VCs thought innovation was dead in semiconductors, a new wave of startups and large companies are redrawing the lines of competition in an industry dominated for a half-century by the "Wintel" duopoly of Intel and Microsoft.

Ben & David venture to the land down under (and reunite in-person!) to tell the story of the granddaddy of all bootstrapped tech success stories, collaboration software company Atlassian. How did two plucky college grads from Sydney, Australia go from just trying to escape working for the man to becoming two of the top 10 wealthiest people in the entire country, all without raising a dollar of venture capital? We dive in.

Today our heroes cover a deal that might have more impact on life in Silicon Valley than AI, wearables and AR/VR combined... Nestle's acquisition of Blue Bottle Coffee. Will hipster entrepreneurs and the VCs who love/need them continue to line up around the block for their minimalist coffee experience of choice, now that it's owned by the Nesquik Bunny? Is this the beginning of Blue Bottle pod machines filling the empty counter space left by Juicero's demise in VC offices throughout South Park? We investigate.

Acquired is back and live on the scene! After months of speculation, Google announces today their acquisition (err, "Cooperation Agreement") of a large portion of HTC's hardware division. What does this mean for the future of mobile? Can Google transform itself into a vertically integrated device company and compete directly with Apple? Most importantly, when will we see more Beats Android handsets??? (We hope never)

On this extra-long episode of Acquired, Brian McCullough from the Internet History Podcast returns to discuss perhaps the most (in)famous merger of all time: AOL - Time Warner. Who doesn't remember the soothing sounds of 56k modems and the timeless phrase, "You've Got Mail"? Join us all as we unpack how one of the biggest ISP's of the 90's tried to take over the world... and failed.

Unicorns and ratchets and lawsuits, oh my! Our heroes dive into the history of Jack Dorsey's famous "other" company, Square. Was the Square IPO a canary in the coal mine signaling doom & gloom for the so-called unicorn companies of the early 2010's, or a mispriced and misunderstood diamond in the rough? Acquired weighs in.

Acquired dives into the legendary acquisition of Ben Horowitz & Marc Andreessen's "second act" software company Opsware, from a perspective never before heard—HP's side of the story! Our heroes are joined by Michel Feaster, who led both the acquisition for HP and then the Opsware product as part of the integrated company afterward under Ben Horowitz. Today the tables have turned: Michel is the Co-Founder and CEO of Seattle-based startup Usermind, and Ben Horowitz sits on her board on behalf of A16Z. This episode is not one to miss!

Acquired trains its lens on the "second or third best acquisition of all-time", Priceline's 2005 purchase of Booking.com. Our heroes are joined by friend-of-the-show and former Jetsetter & Room 77 CEO Drew Patterson to help understand how this little-known startup from The Netherlands grew into the largest travel company in the world, with nearly $8B in annual revenue. Was this deal even better than Instagram??? We debate, hotly.

Ben & David cover the creation of the gaming world's equivalent of the 70's rock supergroup: the 2008 merger of Blizzard and Activision. We tell the story from the Blizzard perspective, tracing the history of one of the most innovative companies in the business from humble beginnings at the hands of UCLA undergrads, to surviving multiple acquisition rollups (including at one point being owned by the French national water company), to joining ultimately with Activision to form the largest gaming company in the world, all while inventing multiple game genres that define the industry as we know it today.

Click here to take the 2017 Acquired Survey. It takes 5-10 minutes, and you may win a pair of AirPods (woo!)

Ben and David are once again live on the scene, this time covering the biggest disruption in grocery since... well, sliced bread: Amazon's $13.7B purchase of Whole Foods Market. We place this deal in context by diving deep into the long, intertwining history of grocery, tech and Amazon, from the infamous dotcom flameout Webvan (domain name now owned by Amazon) to its much more successful progeny Kiva Systems (acquired by Amazon in 2012) to current Silicon Valley unicorn Instacart (founded by former Amazon logistics engineer Apoorva Mehta). One thing is clear: for Amazon and Jeff Bezos, realizing the longterm vision of the Everything Store truly means building the everything store.

Ben & David revisit the birth of the digital music revolution and Steve Jobs' "digital hub" strategy, with Apple's 2000 acquisition of the Mac music player SoundJam MP, which would go on to become iTunes. We relive the 90's with brushed metal interfaces, music visualizers and of course, software sold in (physical) boxes.

Ben and David continue Acquired's "tech and sports" mini-series with Disney's 2016 acquisition of a minority stake (with the right to purchase a majority stake at a later date) in BAMTech, the internet streaming company originally founded as part of Major League Baseball in the early 2000's. However the importance of this story goes deeper than just sports, with major ramifications for nearly every major technology company from Amazon to YouTube. Even if you're not not sure if baseball's played on a diamond or a gridiron, tune in as we swing for the fences in predicting the future of TV!

In honor of the start of NBA playoffs, Ben & David venture off the beaten path to explore one of Steve Ballmer's most famous acquisitions, his 2014 purchase of the Los Angeles Clippers NBA franchise. Was this landmark purchase a steal or a turnover for the former Microsoft CEO? We speculate wildly!

Ben & David transcend the barriers of "real" reality, and dive into Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg's geek-eutpoia vision of the future of gaming, social, and maybe even the entire internet: strapping goofy-looking goggles to your face. Is VR for real this time or are we living through another Virtual Boy moment? Tune in to find out!

Ben & David "pour over" the 1992 IPO of the legendary Seattle coffee company with the help of Dan Levitan, who served as lead investment banker on the IPO and who would later co-found the venture capital firm Maveron with Starbucks' CEO Howard Schultz.

Ben & David dive deep into the early days of internet search, with the help of the best in the internet history business: Brian McCullough from the Internet History Podcast! We are huge fans of IHP at Acquired, so this was a real treat to collaborate with Brian and the great work he does over there. In this episode we cover the story of how a small incubator in Southern California spawned perhaps the greatest tech business model of all-time, Yahoo!'s fumbling of that golden opportunity, and Google's recovery of that fumble to cross into the end zone of tech history behind the biggest moat ever constructed on the internet.

SNAP! Acquired is live on the scene reporting from the "Super Bowl" of 2017 tech events: Snap Inc's hugely anticipated (and just plain huge) IPO. What does the future hold for this plucky "camera company"? Will Snap's IPO endure as tech's most important picture-frame since the 2012 debut of Facebook, or is it destined to fade as just another snapshot? We debate!

Brad Stone, Senior Executive Editor of Global Technology at Bloomberg and author of The Upstarts and The Everything Store, joins Ben & David to dive deep into the Uber-Didi saga, a wild story with far-reaching implications that still aren't fully appreciated by most of the Western tech community. Brad has been the foremost US chronicler of Didi through his reporting at Bloomberg and work on The Upstarts, and shares fascinating insights about its founder & CEO Cheng Wei, how the tech landscape is evolving in China, and lessons & themes that other technology communities around the world can learn from their rapid rise.‍

Ben & David venture into the semiconductor world, analyzing two hallmark Apple acquisitions: P.A. Semi and AuthenTec, both of which would go on to form the basis of core Apple product features in the "A" series of processors and TouchID sensors. Was Cupertino smart to bring these components in-house? Is there more value realized in the whole of Apple's products than the sum of its parts? We investigate! (Spoiler alert: um, yeah. :)

Ben & David wrap up 2016 with a review of the top tech themes we discussed on the show this year, and look forward to which themes we think will be relevant in the coming year. Can our hosts predict the future? Tune-in in 2018 to find out!

‍Note: we apologize for the less-than-amazing audio quality on this one. We're still working on tuning our remote recording setup!

Ben & David welcome very special guest Tom Alberg, board member and first lead investor in Amazon.com, to cover the IPO of "earth's most customer-centric company". From longterm thinking to flywheels to riding big waves, this episode is chock full of lessons and stories from the journey of building one of tech's most iconic franchises. We hope you enjoy listening as much as we did recording it!

Ben & David chat with Brian Schultz, the Managing Director of Strategic Investments & Corporate Development at Microsoft, about Microsoft's approach to M&A, investing, and partnering with startups — and his journey from acquirer to acquiree and back again!‍

Ben and David complete the Disney acquisition trilogy, covering the "house that Mickey built"'s 2009 acquisition of Marvel Entertainment. Will our own superheroes save the day for shareholders, or perish at the hands of villainous corporate raiders? Tune in to find out!

Hey Acquired listeners. A note about this show: we recorded this episode the night before the 2016 Election Day in the US. At the time, the biggest change we saw coming was adding a new type of content to Acquired in analyzing IPO's, which we introduce in this episode. Two days later, we woke up to a very different world than the one we were expecting.

Reflecting on what's happened, and the past few months of our show, we wanted to say two things:

First, we want to apologize for our cavalier attitude toward this election cycle, and our glossing over the clearly very real problems and deep divide in America that it represented. In the Skype episode, David pretty glibly compared the AT&T - Time Warner merger to "Make America Great Again", arguing that any reactionary force is "on the wrong side of history" and cannot be relevant in a changing world. That was wrong, the sentiment behind it was wrong, and it was insensitive to the very real pain a lot of people are feeling out there on both sides. 

Second, looking back on this particular episode about the Facebook IPO, we think it actually might present a relevant parable for our country right now and--we hope--some important lessons for the technology industry going forward. For all the wonderful aspects of the tech industry that we celebrate on this show, there is no doubt that it also bears a great deal of responsibility for the current divide in America, and especially in its contribution to wealth inequality. Likewise, for all the wonderful aspects to the Facebook IPO story, as told in this episode, there is a very dark side as well: Facebook shareholders, investment banks and institutional investors raked in billions of dollars at the expense of individual retail investors who lost their shirts. 

At the same time, Facebook's perseverance through their "broken IPO", and their determination in overcoming with incredible speed the massive, existential challenge to their business model posed by mobile, is something we think *can be* an inspiration to us all on how to move forward even when that seems hard. We hope you'll listen to this episode with that in mind and think about how you, we, and the technology industry as a whole can do better in serving everyone in this country and in the world. 

Thanks for being on this journey with us. We're sorry for our shortcomings, and we're going to keep working hard to do better. 

- Ben & David

An acquisition so wild and crazy, they had to do it again. And again. Ben & David cover tech's perhaps most-traded asset, Skype (which also happens to be a fantastic business). How do we even know which deal to grade? Tune in to find out...

Ben & David broadcast live from the 2016 GeekWire Summit covering one of the all-time greats, Apple's 1996 acquisition of NeXT. This episode has it all: the Steve Jobs hero story, Apple, I.M. Pei, Ross Perot, Aaron Sorkin, Nobel Laureates and... Gil Amelio? Does NeXT rank atop the best acquisitions ever? Our own heroes cast their votes.

CFO of Zillow Group Kathleen Philips joins Ben and David to cover the show's first true "merger" versus "acquisition" (only took 22 episodes!), Zillow's 2015 combination with Trulia to form Zillow Group.

‍Note: our audio glitches unfortunately continued on this episode, and quality is rough. We recommend listening on speakers vs headphones if you're able. We apologize and will be back to normal quality next time!

Ben and David go inside the M&A press with Bloomberg's technology M&A reporter and host of the Deal of the Week Podcast, Alex Sherman. If you've ever wondered how stories about big deals get broken or what "according to people familiar with the matter" really means, tune in for the behind-the-scenes scoop!
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Note: A technical glitch with our recording setup created occasional short silences between Alex's comments and Ben & David's. It shouldn't impact listenability, but we apologize for the awkward pauses!

Ben & David examine Google's 2005 purchase of Android for a rumored $50M, undeniably one of the best technology acquisitions of all time. But will it top the list of these tough graders? Tune in to find out.

Ben & David break down Jet.com's meteoric rise, culminating in Walmart's blockbuster $3B+ acquisition of the company just two years after its founding. Will we look back on this deal as an ‘Instagram-like' bargain or a ‘Pets.com'-sized blunder? And most importantly, can *anyone* compete with Amazon going forward? We speculate wildly.

Ben & David are joined by special guest Taylor Barada, VP and Head of Corporate Development & Strategic Partnerships at Adobe, to discuss how large tech acquirers approach buying companies. This episode is full of great insights for startups & entrepreneurs who might find themselves navigating the M&A process, as well as anyone curious about the craft of dealmaking and the strategic approach of large acquirers.

Topics Covered

• How conversations begin between startups and acquirers
• The importance of building a relationship with acquirers over time and "investing in lines, not dots" (just like raising VC)
• The often under-appreciated role of culture fit between acquirers and acquisition targets
• How entrepreneurs should evaluate acquirers throughout the M&A process
• Two examples of successful acquisitions Taylor completed at Yahoo in Citizen Sports and IntoNow
• The M&A process at large technology acquirers, from initial conversations to LOI, due diligence and the definitive merger agreement
• The relative roles of Corp Dev, business/product owners and executive sponsors in the M&A process
• Common mistakes startups (and VC's) often make in the M&A process
• Different "categories" of M&A that acquirers think about, and the relative risks & opportunities of "core" acquisitions vs transformative new businesses
• What percentage of deals Adobe looks at actually happen, and the importance of being willing to say no
• M&A as a tool for strategy, and the different M&A cultures & approaches at different companies
• Tech themes Taylor and Adobe think about as part of their M&A strategy
• Evaluating the longterm success of deals and the importance of the M&A integration function

Follow-ups

• Ben & David's quick take on Instagram Stories! 

Carve Outs

• Ben: Why the Concorde failed by Vox
• David: Simone Biles, the greatest gymnast of all time
• Taylor: Mindset by Carol Dweck, Shoe Dog by Phil Knight, Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World by Adam Grant

Ben and David navigate the mobile platform wars of 2012-13, avoiding speed traps en route to Waze's destination as a $1B+ acquisition by Google.

The meta show: Ben and David turn their gaze inward and examine the podcasting industry through E. W. Scripps' recent acquisitions of the Midroll podcast advertising network and Stitcher podcast client. Featuring discussion of our own product process and metrics at Acquired.

Ben and David return to make their first foray into enterprise software, covering Salesforce's $2.5B acquisition of ExactTarget in 2013 with the help of special guest and ExactTarget cofounder & CEO, Scott Dorsey.

‍Technical note: due to an issue we didn't catch during recording, audio quality is significantly lower than usual for this episode (especially David's voice). We apologize but hope you'll give it a chance anyway— Scott offers great wisdom & insights, and the ExactTarget success story is a inspiring one underdog entrepreneurs, especially (but not limited to!) anyone located in the Midwest or elsewhere outside of traditional "Silicon Valley-style" tech hubs.

Ben and David cover the 3-day-old acquisition of LinkedIn by Microsoft for $26.2 billion. They cover LinkedIn's founding story by Reid Hoffman, break down their core businesses, analyze recent stock behavior, and speculate on the future of the company inside Microsoft. The big question - were they worth the price tag?

Ben and David are joined by Todd Bishop, technology reporter and co-founder of GeekWire, to discuss Facebook's 2011 acquisition of Push Pop Press. Highlights include:

• The founding story of Push Pop Press by Kimon Tsinteris and Mike Matas.
• The evolution of Facebook Creative Labs, Facebook Paper, and eventually, Facebook Instant Articles.
• Facebook's role in the changing media landscape today.
• GeekWire's experiments with Facebook Instant Articles, Google Accelerated Mobile Pages, and live video.

Ben and David tackle their first failed acquisition: Facebook's 2013 offer to buy Snapchat. They cover the fascinating story of Snapchat's creation and growth, their blossoming business model, how it would be different inside of Facebook, and what the future holds.

Ben and David return to technology acquisitions by examining a classic: eBay's 2002 purchase of PayPal.

Ben and David deviate entirely from the stated purpose of the show, tackling this non-technology acquisition that is so recent, we have no idea if it went well yet. But, the April 2016 acquisition of Virgin America by Alaska Airlines was so fascinating, we had to do it! 

Ben and David continue the cloud productivity saga with Google Docs. They examine the suite of acquisitions made by Google with a focus on Writely in 2006. They tackle:

• The nuts and bolts of the Upstartle (company behind Writely) acquisition, founded by Sam Schillace, Steve Newman and Claudia Carpenter.
• SaaS offerings in cloud productivity today.
• Was this a good idea for Google?
• Google's future bets.
• A new section: The Carve Out!

Ben and David have special guest Kurt DelBene on to discuss Microsoft's acquisition of Acompli, Sunrise, and Wunderlist. Kurt is the EVP of Corporate Strategy and Planning at Microsoft, and joins to discuss Microsoft's cloud-first, mobile-first strategy, and the importance of being cross-platform in the modern era. They cover:

• How the app of Outlook Mobile on iPhone and Android came to be.
• How to decide whether to build vs. buy, and how it plays into the strategy for Office.
• How to preserve a culture and a team, and how Javier Soltero came to run all of Outlook at Microsoft.
• The origin of Outlook on the PC, originally led by Brian MacDonald as "Ren".
• How to balance a business with competing priorities, and a decision-making framework for acquisitions in a large company.
• How to measure the success of an acquisition, and how sometimes, it's not by measuring revenue at all.

Ben and David test the widely-held belief that YouTube was one of the most successful tech acquisitions of all time. In today's world of next-generation video platforms, mobile video, streaming, and chord-cutting, was it actually a great purchase by Google?

As discussed in the show, here is Sequoia's original YouTube investment memo - a rarely-shared gold mine for anyone interested in startup investing.

Riding closely on the tails of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Ben and David cover Disney's 2012 acquisition of Lucasfilm. In the episode, they mention Walt Disney's original flywheel diagram, seen below.

iTunes Link

In the last episode of 2015, Ben and David discuss Apple's acquisition of Siri. Notable topics include:

• The founding of Siri by Dag Kittlau, Adam Cheyer, and Chris Brigham.
• Scott Forstall on the Apple side, and the end of his time at the company.
• The other Apple acquisitions around Siri, including Topsy, Novauris Technologies, OttoCat.
• Cue, Spotsetter, VocalIQ, and Perceptio.
• The team Apple built around Siri post-acquisition, including Alex Acero from Microsoft Research.
• Speculation on the future of voice and its role in everyday computing.

Ben and David are joined by Former Microsoft VP and Co-Founder of Xbox, Ed Fries, to discuss the Bungie acquisition and the development of Halo. Highlights include:

• Ed's call with Steve Jobs after the acquisition, and sharing the stage with Steve and Bungie Co-Founder Alex Seropian at the Macworld Keynote.
• Bungie today, and the unlikely path to get there led by Harold Ryan.
• How to find something that all parties want to get a deal done, the creation Peter Tamte's spin-out Mac gaming studio, and orchestrating the division of current Bungie projects and assets with Take-Two, led by Ryan Brandt.
• Saving a project that's off schedule and missing the mark, and how Jason Jones led the effort to make Halo 2 a hit at launch.

Ben and David discuss Amazon's acquisition of Twitch in 2014. Unlike previous episodes, this recent acquisition still has a lot of open questions, and Amazon hasn't publicly reported growth of Twitch since the purchase. Ben and David talk about Justin Kan's original product with Justin.tv, and the transformation into the Twitch that Emmett Shear is running today.

Ben and David discuss Facebook's acquisition of Instagram in 2012. Was it a success? If so, what are the criteria that made it work? What lessons can be learned for other acquisitions in the future?

Ben and David discuss Disney's acquisition of Pixar in 2006. Was it a success? If so, what are the criteria that made it work? What lessons can be learned for other acquisitions in the future?

iTunes Link