

Ask HN: If your startup ever goes public, what stock symbol would you use? - vaksel

Would you use one that somehow spelled out your company name(Google - GOOG) or would pick one that spelled out your product(SUN - JAVA) or would you pick one that spelled out your niche(AVIS - CAR) or something completely random?
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mahmud
Before you go public, or selling for that matter, make sure your startup is
not your life's work. My first project was one I worked on since I was 16 and
sold it when I was 24. Granted, it wasn't a startup but a software product, it
was to me a combination of high school, college and graduate school. When I
sold it and signed the ridiculous non-compete papers, I had NOTHING else to
work on. Even the much taunted liberal arts PhDs get to keep their titles; I
kept nothing. (sure, I was happy to sell it by then, because I was burned out,
but it might have been better to delay the negotiations until I was in a
better emotional and financial state and was optimistic about the future.)

I know this is tangential to the topic at hand, but had to air my grievances
to warn someone else who might be tying their startups with their personal
identities.

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cmars232
FSCK or ARGH would be funny symbols.

Honestly, I wouldn't care much about what it was called at that point. My eyes
would be big glazed-over dollar-signs.

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csomar
I prefer to use the first choice, (Google - GOOG) or (Microsoft - MSFT) as
it's unique and represent my company

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medianama
WEB - not sure if its available

~~~
medianama
or WWW

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bgnm2000
EXC (granted I have yet to check whether it exists)

