Unicorn CEOs Spout Off on the Dangers of Billion-Dollar Valuations (Video)

What do Slack, Houzz and Stripe have in common? All three are unicorns — the Silicon Valley term for companies valued at $1 billion or more. In fact, in the last year, all three startups have landed investments valuing each at more than $2 billion. But with those lofty valuations come risks for the CEOs leading these startups.

Slack’s Stewart Butterfield, Houzz’s Adi Tatarko and Stripe’s Patrick Collison discussed how their sky-high valuations affect their respective startups in an interview with Kara Swisher and Liz Gannes on the final day of this year’s Code Conference.

While Tatarko said the numbers don’t add pressure to her job, Collison and Butterfield acknowledged the risks that come with them.

“One is the impact it has on motivation,” said Butterfield, whose business messaging service is valued at $2.8 billion. “The bigger problem for us is avoiding the feeling of okay, we’ve done it.”

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

We're here to shed some clarity

One of our core beliefs here at Vox is that everyone needs and deserves access to the information that helps them understand the world, regardless of whether they can pay for a subscription. With the 2024 election on the horizon, more people are turning to us for clear and balanced explanations of the issues and policies at stake. We’re so grateful that we’re on track to hit 85,000 contributions to the Vox Contributions program before the end of the year, which in turn helps us keep this work free. We need to add 2,500 contributions this month to hit that goal. Will you make a contribution today to help us hit this goal and support our policy coverage? Any amount helps.

One-Time Monthly Annual

$5/month

$10/month

$25/month

$50/month

Other

$

Yes, I'll give $5/month

Yes, I'll give $5/month

We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. You can also contribute via