Odeo’s Buyback Rodeo
Yesterday the news came down that Odeo (the fun little podcast startup) is shifting gears bigtime and transitioning to greener pastures and bigger/better things. In what’s got to be the most interesting “Web 2.0” industry story of the past few weeks, Ev Williams used (I estimate) a few million dollars of his own money to buy back the shares he originally sold to VCs when the company started. Now, Odeo.com is owned by Ev’s new company Obvious Corp. and he’s psyched because he now has the control he wants to experiment and produce services that don’t have to be tied down by his investors’ wishes. Damn, if that doesn’t show Ev’s enormous conviction then I don’t know what does. I’m excited to see what Odeo morphs into and what new products they’ve got coming. It just goes to show that as soon as the investors come in, your control goes out, and Ev wanted it back.
Update: Investor Mark Evans posts his thoughts and I think he misses the point completely, saying that the reason it happened is because the VCs had little interest in Odeo and that they were low on money or about to run out. Mark, this isn’t Ev trying to save a sinking ship, it’s him using 7 figures of his own money to buy back control and do what he wants to do, not what his investors think will make the best exit strategy. My comment over there goes into a little bit more detail.