What drives startup acquisitions? 7 lessons from buyer-mindset M&A workshop

Last week I helped run a closed session “M&A readiness - understanding the buyer mindset” roundtable in London for a founder community.

Sharing the main lessons here as they could be helpful for founders starting to think of exits.

1) Own your objective: know if you want liquidity, scale, or a pure hand-off before you talk to buyers.

2) Overlap is everything: deals happen only when a startup solves a pressing problem for the acquirer.

3) Value > revenue: tech, talent, and time-to-market often outweigh today’s P&L.

4) Org vs individual: people with promotions on the line can swing a deal more than the strategy deck.

5) Buy vs build math: E.g: Strava bought Runna because ready users beat a 12+ month build. Speed & customer adoption matter.

6) Top - down and bottoms - up: win a senior sponsor, then get the operators excited (or vice-versa).

7) Value x Visibility = Valuation: build something worth buying and make sure the right people see your value.

Full notes are in the post (7-min read).

Curious to hear HN’s experiences: Which of these resonates based on your experience?

Happy to dig into questions on buyer psychology, buy-vs-build decisions, or anything else.