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Comment by paxys | Hacker News Reader

Why do you think it wasn't possible for them to run out of money? It's not like a 10 year old business is immune to failure.

The simplest explanation is usually the correct one.

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Anything is possible and running out of money is the most probable explanation but it seems so hard for this type of business to get itself into this type of situation. Customers pay thousands of dollars per year, usually upfront. That’s the type of revenue predictability that most of us would love for our businesses because it makes forecasting so much easier. They must have known months ago that they were running out of money. Failing to become sustainable and going through layoffs is one thing, shutting down overnight with zero warning is another. But yes, you’re probably right, it’s just hard to imagine how they could have imploded like this.

And yet, it's as simple as money ran out. They never turned a profit, investors ran out, the last round of funding was a loan with strings attached that led to a bunch of cost cutting and other poor decisions that explain the poor service quality.

A few staff guessed it might close 3 weeks ago at best though everything was very uncertain, but most of the accountants probably didn't see this coming either.

source: I know a few former employees.

There’s an accountant shortage, so I imagine it wasn’t hard for those folks to prepare to bail, if they did.

>but most of the accountants probably didn't see this coming either.

I would expect this was the kind of thing an accountant should see coming though.

Not sure if sarcasm, but in case it is not: in theory accountants could see this coming but most benchmates were junior book keepers, with no visibility into their employer's financials.

If I can't see the books I move on. The only reason people hide books is because they are bad. You can't expect a bunch of mushrooms to help you grow a company. Employees deserve to keep tabs on the financial health of the company.

Last company I was at was an ESOP. Talk about a scam. They are under no obligation to let employees monitor the health of their "retirement plan." It's a tax shelter for business owners who want to retire. Coming from a company that had open books I had assumed that ESOP members would have some rights, nope.

Having left that shit show for a startup I'm getting regular financial health and funding updates constantly.

Don't be a mushroom.

> If I can't see the books I move on

Are you saying that as a software developer, or you work with other things?

Running out of money right at year end, just when accounting revenue is likely to pick up is a bit sus.

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