It’s good to be the king.
As founder of LinkedIn, Reid Hoffman still holds 14.7 million shares of the company’s stock. Microsoft is buying the company at a value of $26 billion.
Overall that translates into $196 per share. Which means that Hoffman, who is currently executive chairman of LinkedIn and a partner at venture capital firm Greylock, will make $2.88 billion on the deal.
Even better: Hoffman holds “Class B” shares, which give him 10 votes for each share he owns. That means he effectively controls 53 percent of the voting shares. And that means he can singlehandedly approve the deal.
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Which he pledged to do, according to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, in a conference call with analysts and reporters.
Current LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner holds 408,000 shares, which will be worth $78 million. Weiner also has another 650,000 options that will be worth $127 million under the terms of the deal.
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