I could spend hours discussing early-stage startup operations and community-based marketing, but deal flow is my blind spot.
But when investment banking firm UBS picked up financial robot-advisor Wealthfront for $1.4 billion in an all-cash deal this week, I noticed.
“At those prices, the company’s exit price is a win in that it represents a 2x or greater multiple on its final private valuations,” wrote Alex Wilhelm in The Exchange. “But its exit value is also parsable from a number of alternative perspectives: AUM, customers and revenue,” he added.
Examining each of those factors in turn, Alex found that the deal is more than just a “next-gen push” intended “to r …