"public benefit" entries
Yancey Strickler on Kickstarter and public benefit corporations
The O’Reilly Solid Podcast: Kickstarter’s CEO on different models for viewing a company’s success.
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Kickstarter is one of just a handful of large companies that have become public benefit corporations — committing themselves legally to social as well as financial goals.
In making the transformation, Kickstarter’s leaders have taken a pragmatic, active position in promoting social good — neither purely philanthropic nor purely profit driven.
In this episode of the Solid Podcast, David Cranor and I talk with Kickstarter’s co-founder and CEO, Yancey Strickler, about his decision to take the company through the public benefit process and his promise not to go through an IPO.
Strickler will be among the speakers at the Next:Economy summit, November 12-13, 2015, in San Francisco.
Discussion points:
- Kickstarter’s reasoning behind its decision not to go public. Why not just sell the company and devote the proceeds to charity?
- The difference between a B corp and a public benefit corporation
- The “public good” principles in Kickstarter’s Benefit Corporation charter
- Determining metrics that can quantify public benefit goals
- Strickler’s thoughts on how Kickstarter’s PBC designation might influence a corporate model “different than hyper-growth, hyper-capitalist models that aren’t good for anyone other than people investing money”