3.7 million euros, to which the available cash would be added: that is the amount I have just been offered for ScalarX Europe.
I turned it down.
Not after several weeks of thought, nor in an attempt to negotiate a few extra hundred thousand euros, and not because I consider the offer insulting either. It was not. It is a fine offer.
I turned it down for a much simpler reason: ScalarX is not for sale.
There is a fairly widespread idea among entrepreneurs that every company is meant to be sold on, and ultimate success means turning several years of work into a large bank transfer before setting off to build something else.
That is not my vision. I am not looking for an exit, even with one more zero.
This company today generates about 700,000 euros in annual recurring revenue, with excellent retention, organic growth, minimal staffing needs and practically no sales or marketing activity.
It leaves me an enormous amount of free time, while financing its own development and the projects I want to build around it.
Selling it would amount to exchanging a profitable asset, self-sufficient, growing and taking up little time, for a sum of money that would then have to be reinvested to try to recover… exactly the same characteristics.
That would make no sense.
I do not need cash. I do have a real-estate project, but it serves ScalarX and its development, not the other way around.
I have no investors to repay, no fund waiting for its exit, no debt that forces me to make a trade-off, no exhaustion pushing me toward the door, and no desire whatsoever to retire.
With ScalarX, as with Override Capital, I am not building in order to maximize resale value. I am building so as to have tools, revenue, infrastructure, operational capacity and a freedom of execution that let me work on the projects I consider important, without having to ask permission from an investor, a bank or any outside organization.
3.7 million euros, that is more than 4 million once the available cash is added, obviously represents a lot of money by my standards. Before tax, naturally, because once the tax authorities have taken their cut, substantially less remains.
But money is truly useful only when it expands what is possible. Yet in my case, this sale would have reduced it.
Even though there is obviously an element of passion in building my brands, the most rational choice was to keep the machine that produces freedom, recurring revenue and options for the next twenty years.
The price of a company is not always the main question. Knowing what you lose by selling it matters too.
When this kind of situation arises, and it is a situation I experienced with a previous company a few years ago, the prospect of cashing a large check can push certain parties to apply considerable pressure, or even to resort to illegal means when their interests are no longer aligned with those of the company or of its founders.
I learned from that experience.
That is one of the main reasons I now have no outside partner and no investor in these projects: I want to prevent, right from the design stage, conflicts of interest that could compromise their independence, their strategy or their future.
Finally, even if I do not always look it, especially since I fell ill, my ambition has not disappeared.
I do not intend to settle for the current ARR. I intend to drive it quickly to 7 million euros, then multiply it again, far beyond that.
Have a great day, everyone.
—
Christophe Casalegno (find all my social links at: all.bo)
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