FeeFighters Acquired By Groupon

I think it's more that many of us are having trouble understanding how FeeFighters fits in with Groupon.

The strategy that I could see working well would be for Groupon to extend Groupon/FeeFighters to include a Shopify competitor. They have the credit card processing and the relationships with local businesses. "Are you enthusiastic about selling online? Want to extend your online presence and sales?"

Just continuing FeeFighters as-is wouldn't really help Groupon substantially. I mean, FeeFighters might be profitable and a good business, but if it doesn't tie-in nicely to one of Groupon's current or future businesses, it might not be a good purchase. So, I think we all expect something is going to happen - something to leverage a collective strength rather than basically being two separate companies with separate revenue and separate customers just jointly owned.

I think there's a reason why some might be worried. When a company gets acquired, sometimes that product gets discontinued (even if claims are made otherwise during the acquisition). Othertimes, the product languishes. Hopefully that won't be the case here, but it's hardly unheard of. Heck, even without a merger, directions can change. I remember when Heroku had a web editing interface and they gave that up well before being bought. But when an acquisition happens, sometimes new combinations of people lead to new ideas and the old ideas don't seem as exciting (or as likely to be useful/profitable). The acquiring company may think they will continue the acquired property, but six months later it becomes clear that they want to spend their resources elsewhere. I'm not saying that will happen - in fact, Heroku's purchase by Salesforce is a perfect contradiction as it has done wonderful things since acquisition. However, Jaiku, FeedBurner, Dodgeball, Gizmo5, DimDim, and others all show that a product can be discontinued or languish in a state that feels like no one is looking at it after an acquisition.

I guess if there was some announcement of "everyone, we're working on a new way to get local businesses online easily with FeeFighters credit card processing" we'd all feel like "nice! I can see how that would fit well and will continue to be an awesome, actively developed product." While there's no real reason to doubt the post, at least in the back of our heads we have to be thinking about whether it was a talent acquisition or how committed Groupon is going to be to FeeFighters.

> pg started mailing his companies to stop commenting on HN because it's a fever swamp

Wow, really? That's unfortunate that HN can no longer function PR-less.

BTW, would you mind linking to a source, or something? I must have missed it when it happened, would be interesting to read. Thanks in advance.

Yes I think ktsmith has hit the nail on the head on synergies.

In my mind, this acqusition is about making good on the IPO. A lot of people, including me, are skeptical about how Groupon can differentiate itself from the competition. It looks like Groupon is trying to address that with this acquisition... it's trying to position itself as the easiest deal service to work with--an interesting strategy, considering that many businesses don't come back to Groupon after the first deal.

Well obviously. Since when are press releases a reliable source of information? Especially given the number of companies that say "our product is not going to change" only to have the product change six months later.

"we are not planning any major changes to our product line... our brands are continuing as before" can also be interpreted as stagnation, aka “don't expect anything new because our best devs will be working on Groupon's stuff”.

I think it was a fair question.

I agree that GP's "great outcome for everyone" is probably a bit empty, but there's no shame in an acquisition, and "selling out" is a bit of a naive term. They were a for-profit business and realized they could profit most by selling the company. Why this unnecessary delusion that every startup founder is directed solely by a divine inner light?

I am a fee fighters "customer" and I don't really give a shit whether they are acquired. They sent me to gravity payments, who gave me an awesome deal that I wouldn't have known about except for HN and FeeFighters. I am happy now. I am drunk as well, so I'll be the first one to toast the team at FeeFigherts.

FeeFighers biggest weakness is that no one has ever heard of them. Groupon can fix that problem with almost no effort.

I'd like for my favorite band(s) to sign to big labels and hopefully become rich. Sure, if they are going the route of bigger labels, I'd perhaps prefer them to sign with an established indie label before something like Sony, but it is still better than them remaining unknown. It's sad when I know some of my favorite bands of yesteryear never financially made much from the bands work.