CB Insights offered $100M acquisition, co-founder Anand Sanwal declines

Co-founder and CEO Anand Sanwal shared on Twitter screenshots of how this particular acquisition conversation unfolded between the interested party and him.

Friday March 11, 2022 , 2 min Read

Anand Sanwal, Co-founder and CEO of research firm CB Insights took to Twitter on Friday, March 11, to announce that he has declined a $100 million offer to acquire his company. The co-founder then shared with his followers screenshots of how this particular acquisition conversation unfolded between the interested party and him.

Earlier today, I declined a $100M offer to acquire @CBinsights

1. See how it unfolded in these screenshots
2. A great reminder to never check or respond to Twitter DMs again

cc: CBI board, investors & team pic.twitter.com/WsGtvW1HzI
— Anand Sanwal (@asanwal) March 10, 2022

Anand added that this insight was "A great reminder to never check or respond to Twitter DMs again."

Once Anand expressed his disinterest, the aspiring acquirer of CB Insights got rather passive aggressive and responded that Anand "Missed the opportunity of a lifetime," and that they are going to create and build a competitor.

In a relatable note, Anand also shared his earlier Twitter thread on signs to look for that suggest that one's startup equity won't be worth a penny.

1/ Some signs to look for that suggest your startup equity won't be worth shit

(note: there are probably exceptions but generally, these will steer you right)
— Anand Sanwal (@asanwal) February 16, 2022

New York-headquartered CB Insights was founded in 2008 by Anand and his co-founder Jonathan Sherry. The business analytics and global database company provides market intelligence on private companies and investor activities.

CB Insights' B2B newsletter provides insightful data-driven information in a fun and easy-to-consume format. The research firm spotlights the present and emerging trends in the global technology market, mining data points from unstructured documents. It caters to a marquee list of clients including many Fortune 500 companies like Cisco, and Salesforce. Additionally, it also has FirstMark Capital and Sequoia Capital as its clients.

During YourStory TechSparks 2020, Anand had revealed "The dirtier, the messier the data, the more we like it."

Back in 2020, CB Insights acquired Netherlands-based software company Blockdata and New York-based Dow Jones VentureSource's data assets. The acquisitions were aimed towards getting differentiated data and predictive insights on blockchain and distributed ledger tech esosystem; and understand and make decisions about tech more quickly and confidently, respectively.

Edited by Anju Narayanan