Andreessen Horowitz is pocketing a huge win in the $7.5 billion GitHub acquisition

For all its hype, Andreessen Horowitz has had few mega-exits in its relatively short history in venture capital.

But the buzzy VC firm pocketed over $1 billion when its portfolio company, GitHub, was acquired by Microsoft in a $7.5 billion, all-stock deal, according to a person with knowledge of the figures. Andreessen Horowitz invested $100 million into the software startup in 2012, the single largest check it had ever written.

The firm owned about 13 percent of the company after that deal, according to Pitchbook, and made sure to take its pro rata rights — or right to follow up with more investment at a later date — when Sequoia Capital valued the company at $2 billion in its own deal in 2015. Those were the only two times that the 10-year-old company ever raised money.

That means there are basically just two winners from Microsoft’s purchase. GitHub — bootstrapped without venture capital funding for its first half-decade as a company — raised only about $350 million total before being flipped for $7.5 billion.

Andreeseen Horowitz has had other portfolio companies bought and some have gone public. But while it has taken home big money from investments in companies like Okta, many of its most successful companies are still only successful on paper (Airbnb, Pinterest, Lyft). So after lingering questions about its performance, a big acquisition like GitHub helps cement its place as a top-tier firm.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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