The Best Product and Seller Don't Need to Negotiate

You need to earn the edge

Can you walk away from $350 Million?

(Sabeer Bhatia of Hotmail Did)

Mergers and takeovers are time consuming, complex and very stressful.

A founder and the entire team have to go through a torrent of emotions, complicated contracts, and innumerable situations.

Let's just look at one small incident from one takeover.

When Microsoft was considering taking over Hotmail, Sabeer Bhatia (the co-founder) was one of the points of contact for the Microsoft team.

At one point, Microsoft offered $350 Million dollars to buy Hotmail.

Put yourself in these shoes for just a few moments.

Do you think you would have the guts, the courage to turn down an offer like this?

Guess what?

One of the feathers on Bhatia's cap is that he had the confidence to turn down that offer.

Hotmail was not in an extremely healthy place financially.

Not to forget this is the classic trope of David vs. Goliath at play.

However, when you have hand crafted your product, and you have the vision of an entrepreneur, you also learn to build a muscle that most people will never experience in their lives.

This is the muscle of conviction.

Bhatia knew that he had a really powerful product and the money on the table was a large sum, but Hotmail was worth more.

Hotmail was eventually bought by Microsoft at $500 Million.

That's $150 Million dollars more.

Let this be a reminder to you. What's the cost of having the conviction in your product and not selling yourself short?

$150 Million.

I hope you build a company or become a part of the company that's building a product that's just as impactful and gives the power of conviction to the entire team.

Because that conviction as demonstrated comes with a payday that's worth every difficulty that you'd experience during building the product, the brand and the company.

Drop a comment/ question below to support this post

Keep Going Keep Growing 🚀

Thank you for reading the full post. Since you read this till the end, it’s safe to assume you found value in the content.

Please consider sharing this post with your audience on social media. You may end up helping someone who’s struggling in their career/ business because they don’t understand the importance of building their personal brand.

I’m sure if you think hard, you will easily come with a few names who you know must read this.

Share this with them, help them and earn your blessings.

P.S.: Image made on Meta AI using the prompt, “Imagine two founders shaking hands after a takeover deal worth 2.5 billion Dollars”