I interviewed with a company last month who when I stepped away from the offer table. They almost doubled their equity offer. Even at a low valuation it would have been north of 500k.
The power of equity is not in its cash value my friend. Equity is a huge stick, and how you use it matters.
For example; you can do a forward contract on your equity to delay taxes, and get a cash out without selling the equity. How you structure that deal helps and can be advantageous.
You can use equity as collateral for loans. IE using equity to buy a house in SF for 10-20% down with a huge balloon payment at the end. Backed by equity. In which you then sell the house before the balloon payment hits, you keep the equity, and you also earn equity from the sale of the house.
You can do construction loans backed by equity on new homes. Then sell them for profit. You can do the same with multi-family homes, providing affordable living conditions for folks while taking a chunk off the top.
I really suggest you sit down with an accountant specializing in these things. From your blog you’ve dealt with funds and fundraising. You may understand it from inside a business. You need to understand it from the side of a sales rep or rich individual.
Companies rarely understood the value I brought to them.
You clearly do not understand.
If no one in the room understands the value you bring to the table. The problem does not lie with them. It lies with your ability to communicate and sell that value.
I get fantastic, absolutely stellar performance reviews at every company. At the bank, they were required to put one negative thing on the performance review. You know what the CTO wrote? "Miscapitalized ID in 'cardID' variable name". That was the worst thing they could come up with about my performance.
And they still denied me any pay or equity raise.
And it cost them $600 million.
And of course I asked for more equity. They denied that too.