Not sure about that. When I see the word 'sale' and 'exit' together in one sentence only to find out after a lot of digging that we're talking about a < $50K deal its painting a bad situation as a win-win.

It means that a startup has basically failed, that there may be some technology that can be recycled or that the founder has enough street creds that they can convert their failed startup into a signing bonus and call it an acquisition.