Story
AppLovin's blocked $1B sale turned into a $30B public company
Banker Dick Filippini had AppLovin under contract to sell to a Chinese acquirer for ~$1B, but the FTC blocked it. The Chinese firm instead invested $100M, and AppLovin later went public worth as much as $30B — the founders got far more by NOT closing the original deal.
“he sold AppLovin to a Chinese company for, uh, $1 billion. And the Trump administration blocked the deal, or the FTC blocked the deal. And, uh, instead of it being a billion-dollar sale The Chinese company invested $100 million into AppLovin, and then a couple years later, AppLovin— so everyone I thought would be devastated, like the founders were like, we're going to become so rich overnight once we sell this company for a billion bucks. Transaction doesn't happen. I assume founders are sad and upset. Then a couple years later, the company goes public, and at some point it was worth $30 billion as a publicly traded company.”
Tactic
Don't reflexively say 'we're not for sale' to a buyer
Conventional wisdom says founders should tell buyers they don't want to sell so the buyer chases harder. In practice, acquirers shopping multiple targets just cross the 'not for sale' companies off and focus on the ones who said yes.
“when you ask an entrepreneur if they want to sell their business, entrepreneurs are told to say, no, I do not want to sell my business. And they expect that the buyer is going to come over the top and say, Even if you don't wanna sell your business, we're super interested in buying it. We'll do anything it takes. Uh, please come talk to us. And in practice, that's not at all how it works. Uh, oftentimes a buyer is looking at a bunch of different businesses to buy at that point in time. And so they'll reach out or talk to 10 different businesses. 5 of them will say, no, we're not for sale. And they'll say, okay, great. We're knocking these 5 off.”
Idea
Robinhood for real estate, sold to 20-somethings as a $200/mo subscription
Suleiman's favorite idea: a one-click mobile app that lets people in their 20s auto-invest a set monthly amount (e.g. $200 ACH) into income-generating rental property equity — no cap rates or deal analysis, just a subscription, marketed via Facebook. Like JAR in India did for gold.
“I think there should be a one-click way to be able to go buy equity in rental properties that generate income. And, uh, it should be marketed to, um, people in their 20s. It should be marketed through Facebook. It should be set up so that every— you basically log in and are like, cool, you want to invest in real estate? How much do you want to invest every month? $200? Great. $200 is now happening in real estate. You're now investing $200 in real estate every month, and boom, it does an ACH from your account every month on, on the customer side and invests in that real estate.”
Steal thisBuild a turnkey app that auto-invests a fixed monthly amount into rental-property equity for non-experts.
Take
Startup investing has no moat — even Bill Gurley has to beg
Suleiman soured on startup investing: competing for allocation is demeaning, and even Bill Gurley reportedly called a founder who picked a16z over Benchmark and yelled at them for 2 hours with 15 angry emails. He'd rather buy majority stakes in profitable businesses than write $50K checks and wait 10 years.
“A friend of mine was raising money and got a term sheet from Andreessen Horowitz and Bill Gurley at Benchmark and went with the Andreessen Horowitz term sheet. And Bill Gurley was so mad that he called the founder up and like yelled at them for 2 hours and sent them 15 angry emails. And Bill Gurley is one of the most successful people in the industry, and the fact that he still has to do that made me be like, this is a industry with no moat.”
Story
Suleiman passed on a $25K Coinbase check that would've been $200M
When Brian Armstrong and Fred called Suleiman for advice on their Series A term sheets, he believes he could have asked to put in $25K. He didn't — not because he forgot, but because he didn't believe in crypto, dismissing Coinbase as 'just PayPal.' That $25K would have been worth $200M at IPO.
“on that call, if I was like, hey, by the way, can I put in $25K into this round? Uh, I feel like they would have said yes. And that $25K at their IPO was worth $200 million.”
Story
His father bought Florida homes all the way down to ~100 rentals
With a $1M gift from Suleiman's first exit, his father bought a Florida house for $150K in the 2008 crash; two weeks later it was worth $75K. Instead of panicking, he kept buying on the way down and back up — the family now owns roughly 100 single-family rentals.
“He went and bought a house for $150,000. 2 weeks later, that same house was selling for $75,000. If it was me, I— this is literally what I did— I would have freaked out and said, fuck, I don't know what I'm doing, I'm gonna stop, this is not working. Instead, he bought another house for $75,000, and he just kept buying houses, um, like for the next 2 years, uh, all the way on the way down as the stock market— as the real estate prices, um, bottomed out, kept going down. And then even on the way back up, as they were increasing, he would just keep buying them. And so as a result, he owns— or we as a family now own something like 100, uh, you know, single-family rentals in Florida.”
Idea
Buy Squarespace: a $10B company now public at $3B, run it for profit
Suleiman's top acquisition target is Squarespace — once a $10B private company, now ~$3B public with ~$900M revenue run rate and 4M+ subscribers. It's run at breakeven, not for profit; he'd cut the brand/podcast ads, lean into direct-response Facebook acquisition, and run it for margin.
“the stock is down, you know, 50% since the IPO. They're at this like kind of $900 million revenue run rate now. Uh, it's a subscription business with more than 4 million subscribers. Um, I'd love to buy it because I think it's a great company that's super undervalued. Uh, it's not being run to maximize profits, so it's being run in a way that keeps it at breakeven. So I think you could run it to maximize profits, get rid of those podcast ads, focus on direct response Facebook ads to get new customers.”
Number
Lifestyle dental practice: 7-figure EBITDA, 50% margin, 3 days a week
Suleiman's friend runs a dental practice optimized for lifestyle, not profit: seven figures of EBITDA at a 50% net margin while working only three days a week, leaving a waiting list of patients unserved.
$50
Net profit margin of the dental practice · percent
“So he does 7 figures in EBITDA, has a 50% net margin, all while working 3 days a week.”
Take
Serial founders just build themselves a bigger, brighter prison
The Solo Stove founder put all his exit money into Vanguard's VOO and refuses to invest in startups or funds. His view: entrepreneurs who exit and immediately start another company do it only because it's the only thing they know — building a bigger, brighter prison that's still a prison.
“everyone else who is like this, is an entrepreneur, starts a company, makes it, and then goes back and starts another company, they're only starting another company because that's the only thing they know. And he's like, they just keep building a new prison for themselves that's bigger and brighter, but it's still a prison. And why would you do that?”
Take
Your life is limited by your imagination, not your resources
Suleiman's golden-nugget reframe: he always assumed life was constrained by money or resources, but realizes it's actually constrained by imagination. He spends all his brainpower seeing $100M businesses and almost none imagining fun — so he wants to hire a 'chief fun officer' to fix that.
“the thing I've seen— I now have this thought, which is that my life is actually limited by my imagination. And growing up, I always assumed it was limited by, you know, money or resources. And now I realize my life is just limited by my imagination. And one of the things that made me do is I'm trying to hire a chief fun officer.”
Story
Microsoft job, and dad says quit and start a company
On his first day at Microsoft in 2004, Suleiman Ali called his dad from his new office phone. Instead of congratulating him, his dad told him to quit immediately and start his own company because 'that's where the action is at.'
“And he says, that's all great. You know, cool. You got an office and this is all great that you're excited about what you're doing, but really you should quit your job immediately and start your own company. That's really where the action is at.”
Framework
People overestimate the risk of quitting their job
Ali argues most people overestimate the risk of leaving a job to start a company. With sub-4% unemployment, a competent person can return easily, and the entrepreneurial experience often earns them a higher position than if they'd stayed.
“And I really think a lot— most people overestimate the risk that they're taking when they leave their job. The unemployment rate in the United States is sub-4%. For people who are competent and skilled in their line of work, it's easy for them to go back to their job. I think if I quit Microsoft, started a company and failed for a year or two or three, I could go back to Microsoft and actually get a higher position than what I would have if I had stayed”
Steal thisReframe quitting as low-risk: if you fail, your old industry will take you back, often at a higher level for having tried.
Story
A 2-week Facebook app hit 1 million users and melted the servers
Ali and a friend built a Facebook app called Superlatives in two weeks, hoping 100 friends would use it. Within a month a million people had used it and their database was melting because they knew nothing about architecture.
“So we launched on the Facebook platform, and within a month, a million people had used it, and our servers were melting. We didn't know anything about database architecture, so our database was melting. The app was going down all the time.”
Number
TinyCo's first mobile game made $500K-$600K in month one
TinyCo's first game, Tap Resort, was pushed into the top 5 free apps via a Tapjoy marketing deal, generating $500,000-$600,000 of revenue in its first month from hundreds of thousands of downloads.
$600K
First-month revenue · USD/month
“So we get hundreds of thousands of downloads immediately, and those downloads are turning into revenue. So in the first month of launch, we generate $500,000-$600,000 of revenue.”
Story
How TinyCo won the Family Guy license by asking 'what more can we do?' daily
Competing against EA and Zynga for the Family Guy game license, Ali asked his BD lead every single day what more they could do. They wrote a memo on why EA was wrong, and pulled board member Marc Andreessen and Hollywood's Tom Rothman to vouch for them — winning the deal.
“So every day I would go to Andrew and say, what more can we do to get the deal done today? And he was like, there's no more. I have nothing. There's nothing we could come up with. And I was like, no, we need to come up with something more.”
Steal thisWhen chasing a make-or-break deal, ask 'what more can we do today?' relentlessly until the other side is afraid to say no.
Story
The Iron Man heartbeat: the founder's conviction keeps the company alive
During the near-bankruptcy, Ali compared himself to Iron Man's artificial heart — the only thing keeping the company alive was employees seeing his conviction in the office, and if his heartbeat stopped for one beat, everyone would quit.
“And in Iron Man, he's got sort of this artificial heart that's keeping him alive. And I felt like during this whole time period, the only thing that was keeping the company alive was people seeing me in the office, people seeing the level of conviction that I had, and that, uh, if my heart stopped beating for one beat, the company would die and, uh, everyone would quit and give up.”
Story
Put his last $1M into the company knowing he'd likely never see it again
Out of cash, Ali took a $1M windfall from his MoPub investment and put it into TinyCo behind $10M of SVB debt — financially the wrong call, but he needed to turn the card over and see if there was an ace in the hole.
“And financially, I felt like it was the wrong decision to make. But emotionally I just felt like I need to see this through. I have come this far. Just need to see if this game is successful when we launch it. And I can't give up. And if what it takes is me putting this money in and losing it to find, to turn that card over and find out whether there's an ace in the hole or not, I gotta do it.”