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Comment by stephc_int13 | Hacker News Reader

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stephc_int13·

Why is it adverstised as a merge and not an acquisition?

ironSource is a much smaller company than Unity, if I am not mistaken.

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They're just labelling it a merger for optics - it's absolutely an acquisition with one party buying the other.

I agree, however I'm curious what the incentive for calling it a merge is? Is it part of the deal with ironSource?

Do they, for some reason think that merge sounds better then acquired? Because I'm in the camp that acquired would be more appealing.

Merger sounds much better to the employees of Iron source.

Does anyone there actually care about that… based on the history behind the company (well documented by other commentators on this story here) I can’t imagine management give a flying fuck about anything or anyone, except the money.

This whole press release was written for the executives of both companies, maybe the shareholders, but certainly not the employees, and definitely not the public.

The optics are atrocious for Unity.

As of today, unity is worth 10-12bi, Ironsrc intended to go public at around 11bi last year, now they are being acquired at 4.4bi. Ironsrc main competitor, AppLovin is worth 12bi. Ironsrc 2021 revenue was 553m, Unity revenue was 1.1bi. However, Ironsrc had a net income of 21m and Unity had a net loss of 531m. Both hold around 0.7bi and 1bi in cash respectively.

So is Ironsrc much smaller? I do not think so.

But a merger is a different thing. Can you just say you're a merger if you're not merging two entities to form a new entity?

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