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WhatsApp Founder Used Unchangable Airline Ticket To Pressure Facebook

Posted by timothy on from the they-knew-what-they-were-getting-into dept.

McGruber writes "In a post on the Flyertalk website, WhatsApp founder Jan Koum provides another interesting detail about how he steered WhatsApp into a $16 billion deal with Facebook: 'we announced the deal with Facebook on wednesday after the market closed. during the process, we realized there was a chance we might not be able to get the deal wrapped up and signed on wednesday and it could delay. when the risk of the delay became real, i said: "if we don't get it done on wednesday, it probably wont get done. i have tickets on thursday to fly out to Barcelona which i bought with miles and they are not easily refundable or even possible to change. this has to be done by wednesday or else!!!"...and so one of the biggest deals in tech history had to be scheduled around my M&M award ticket."

4 of 144 comments (clear)

  1. Refund. by o_ferguson · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hey should give all 450 million customers a $1 refund for the service outage that happened after the deal went through.

    --
    - In Soviet Korea, only old people loose all their bases to Natalie Portman's petrified hot grits overlords.
  2. Really though? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's hard to think that FaceBook would take this threat seriously. It's a $10+ Billion deal. Throwing in some extra first class seats for a different day would be the equivalent of a give-a-penny-take-a-penny dish compared to this.

    1. Re:Really though? by Hognoxious · · Score: 5, Funny

      At least he can afford a new keyboard now. One with a shift key, maybe.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  3. Re:How cute by demonlapin · · Score: 5, Informative

    I'll join the karma bonfire. Come on over to Soylent News and enjoy actual news for nerds.