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What does early employee liquidity mean, and how is it beneficial to the investors?

I believe it is referring to things like stock option buybacks, so that early employees can reap some of the rewards from their equity compensation.

It may not directly help investors, who are buying into the company as a whole. It may just be an important tool to holding quality talent, to help Asana be as valuable as it can be in the long run.

However, from a monetary perspective, the investors are willing to buy in today at $1.5B. Option buybacks are usually at less than full valuation. Employees are trading value for a sure payout today. Therefore, using the money to buy back those options from early employees reduces outstanding shares and options and improves the value of remaining investors' ownership.

Exactly. In theory, if the investors can get equity they want at a discount, and employees can get long-awaited cash they want — even not at "full price", because who knows what or when that might be - then everybody wins.

thanks both!

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