

Beyond the IPO Hype – Why we decided to become a private company again - berndg
http://blog.ruxit.com/beyond-ipo-hype-decided-become-private-company/

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ChuckMcM
I have to strongly disagree with the premise of this article, and I lose it
right here : _" Once you have shareholders, your primary focus becomes
fulfilling their expectations. Either they want revenue or they want growth."_

The truth is more like "once you have outside investors" they want you to do
what you say you will do. I'm reminded of Kevin O'Leary (Mr Wonderful on Shark
Tank) who says to folks "I like money, and the money I invest needs to make me
more money." That doesn't matter if you're public or private, you've asked
someone for money, they gave it to you, now you have to do what you said you
would do.

You can contrast that with private company with no outside investors, and that
kind of company (of which there are some notable ones like Fry's Electronics)
where you have no external promises to make.

Ruxit was birthed out of the implosion of CompuWare[1], which is fine and I
love to see good technology escape the demise of its containing company, but I
don't think the fact that CompuWare had been a public company was actual the
reason for its demise, no it was that the mainframe space[2] was going south
fast and that was what they did.

[1] The creation of Ruxit : [http://intellyx.com/2014/10/10/the-rebirth-of-
application-pe...](http://intellyx.com/2014/10/10/the-rebirth-of-application-
performance-management/)

[2] "Nominal" history of CompuWare :
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compuware](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compuware)

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berndg
Compuware has been acquired for all its divisions, including Mainframe and APM
businesses [1]. As they address different markets, the APM business Dynatrace
has been spun out and is run under Dynatrace LLC. Ruxit is now obviously a
part of Dynatrace. References to Compuware on Ruxit sites are mainly around
due to legal reasons. Eventually they will fade out.

The experience we made with Ruxit also made us welcome the opportunity to work
with Dynatrace as private company again. This made me see the recent changes
as opportunity that I as intrapreneural founder, who founded also the original
Dynatrace, wouldn’t want to miss in my career.

[1]
[http://investor.compuware.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=86...](http://investor.compuware.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=869852)

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lettergram
I like the term MDP,

For me I have always seen getting an MVP is the "I want to make money
approach" where the MDP is the "I want to change the world approach."

Although, this obviously creates issues with investors, it seems the best
companies are those that try to invent something new, as opposed to the next
photo sharing app.

Unfortunately, many times this leads to the companies demise. Focusing on
inventing as opposed to money can create a disconnect between company and
users. That being said, I hope Ruxit can make it. I am impressed, and now that
they have customers it seems the MDP strategy probably paid off!

~~~
perlpimp
Dell went private for this reason, I think this is great that companies
realize that there are a number of ways to contribute to economy while
creating meaningful progress. It seems that current IPO/VC based culture is
similar to fast food culture of a ton of sugar, carb and fat that cannibalizes
stability for quick energy/endorphin hit.

~~~
antr
Dell basically delisted itself by buying out public shareholders with private
equity money, which was primarily debt financed. This is far from the MDP
concept mentioned, but simply a pure LBO play. I don't see banks financing
"disruption".

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frik
Compuware acquired dynaTrace software in 2011. Thoma Bravo (risk capital)
bought dynaTrace department from Compuware in late 2014. Ruxit is a new beta
product, a SaaS APM competitor to NewRelic and AppDynamics.

~~~
kgwgk
Thoma Bravo acquired Compuware (not just dynaTrace). The copyright notice at
dynatrace.com reads "2015 COMPUWARE CORPORATION" so it seems the business is
still in operation. Ruxit is "a division of Dynatrace LLC", a company
registered three months ago. It's unclear from the blog post what is its
relationship with Compuware, if any (and what does the "we became a public
company" refer to).

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pavel_lishin
Maybe I'm misreading this, but they didn't really become a private company,
right? They just convinced their board to give them some money and not meddle
with the process for a few years.

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nraynaud
How do you exit your investors if you don't do an IPO or sell? Most investors
have to exit in a time frame for legal reasons and they are not in for the
profit per share anyways, I can only see an LBO by the founders.

~~~
frik
Compuware aquired dynaTrace in 2011, that was the exit. A risk capital bought
the department from Compuware and created an independent company again.

