There's not really an economic philosophy that can protect people from bad decisions. In the middle of year end accounting though, this was a train wreck.
Seems like they could have had huge layoffs, to try to maintain, but maybe they thought the sale would go through before the shutdown, meaning no one gets laid off.
But the buyer waited until after the shutdown to grab it
Presumably, their cost to serve was higher than what their customers were collectively paying.
I'm not defending what they did, but doing the work even one more week was not an option afaik. At best they could have wrapped up earlier?
They should have done that months ago... Maybe they would have been acquired without all the drama...