Saturday, March 1, 2014; 6:02:09 PM Eastern
About software deals
- 1. Software is a process.
- 2. It's never finished. There are always bugs to fix, features to add.
- 3. Usually, when one company buys another, they buy the software, not the process.
- 4. It would be more realistic to contract with a developer or group of developers the way book publishers contract with authors, or studios contract with directors. You buy N books, or movies, or albums. Then the creative person gives you what they contracted for.
- 5. Don't try to hire employees to make products. You need to be able to take creative risks. It's hard to do within a corporation. By "hard to do" I mean impossible. ;-)
- 6. Unlike movies, books, music -- software continually evolves. So even if the initial creator moves on, there always has to be the equivalent of a show runner that stays with the product, the kind of person who does what Vince Gilligan did on Breaking Bad, for example.
- 7. I've now moved on from two products, one through acquisition and one by passing off to a new management team. Both times the product died.
- 8. I'm still trying to figure this out. ;-)