Comment by runako | Hacker News Reader

Comment by runako | Hacker News Reader

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Masimo was worth ~$16B when this was going down. They are worth $8B today. This is roughly the size of American Airlines. Masimo is not the biggest company, but they are a large publicly-traded company.

The company does $2B in revenue and spends close to $800 million annually in sales, general and admin. This is over 3x their R&D budget. (For reference, Apple's R&D spend is higher than its SG&A spend.)

Per levels.fyi, Masimo is paying senior SDEs in HCOL $150k. They could 10x the comp to these critical employees without it being more than a rounding error in their numbers. (I don't think they would have had to go to 10x. Most people would practically tattoo a brand on themselves for a one-time bonus of $1m.)

Long story short: Masimo does indeed have the money to compete on salary with Apple for this set of employees. They chose to spend the money on attorneys instead.

Some companies don't value engineers. That often works, until they end up in an engineering competition against companies that do value engineers.

I disagree with your assertion that Masimo has the money to compete. Apple's upside to employing these folks to build the tech into the Apple Watch is FAR, FAR greater than Masimo's potential sales growth for existing pulse ox devices (or patent licenses). With Apple Watches being licensed as medical devices for ECG & pulse ox, this gives clinicians even more reason to leverage them with patients for convenient 24/7 home monitoring. It's not the same market Masimo is serving, at all.

I specifically did not address any of the corporate competitive dynamics, although it is worth noting that this is more of an existential issue for Masimo than Apple.

My core point is is that Masimo has far more than enough money to pay strategic employees enough money to keep them. Again, I doubt they would have to go as high as $5m/year for each of the relevant engineers. Masimo could spend that without making a major dent in their finances.

Could Apple up the ante and make offers of $5B/yr to each engineer? Sure, but we are likely talking about the difference between Masimo offering $150k and Apple offering $500k. These are numbers any public company can afford.

Masimo sells a health monitoring watch. [1] There is direct competition here.

[1]. https://www.masimo.com/products/monitors/masimo-w1-medical-w...

This product WAS generally marketed to the healthcare field, not to people directly.

It was literally described in the page you referenced: "Arm your patients with continuous measurements in a comfortable, lifestyle-friendly wearable—helping you deliver a true telemonitoring experience."

> automates the collection of clinically accurate measurements to help support: -Post-surgical recovery -Chronic care -Patient management

I say "was" because it was possible to buy it as a consumer, but there's still no direct competition, as:

"Please note that all Masimo consumer products have been discontinued. These include:

MightySat® Masimo W1® Sport Watch Opioid Halo™ / Masimo SafetyNet Alert™ Radius T°® Continuous Thermometer Masimo Stork® Vitals, Masimo Stork Vitals+, and Masimo Stork Baby Monitor"

Im not saying they pay them well or not. Theres just not a comparison on comp they could do. That you don't understand the power dynamics between that is something you will hopefully learn about the world as you become more experienced. Apple would just offer more at the end of the day.

I understand, and this is timely in the context of Meta making $100m offers. I have no data on this, but I would be highly surprised if Apple offered anybody more than $5m/year. Masimo has that much money.

Could Apple go higher? Sure, but again most people who like their jobs are not going to leave once their needs are met.

From a competitive standpoint: Masimo has lost $8B in market cap during this kerfuffle. It's entirely possible it would have been rational for Masimo to pay these employees higher than Apple possibly would go in order to not lose those billions in value.

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