Question
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, is a well-known tech executive. He also happens to own (as of this writing) about 13.6% of Meta (formerly Facebook).
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, is a well-known tech executive. He also happens to own (as of this writing) about 13.6% of Meta (formerly Facebook). So, it would seem that Zuckerberg, while having a sizeable share of Meta (13.6%), isn't completely in the driver's seat. If he has 13.6% of the shares, that means 86.4% of shares are owned by others. Meta is a publicly-traded company. From time to time, matters come up in a publicly traded company that must be voted upon, either "up" or "down". Typically, one share equals one vote.
Except for Mark.
Meta has two classes of shares. "Class A" is one share = one vote. "Class B" is one share = 10 votes.
And guess which type Mark has? That's right. Class B!
Even though he owns a smaller percentage of stock, each Class B share has 10x the voting power of a Class A share.
So this week's discussion question is multi-fold:
1) What impact might this have on the strategy of Meta if Mark has the majority of voting power?
2) Make a short argument for why you would want this same set-up (meaning a majority share of voting power) for a company you have hypothetically founded.
3) What might be a situation where you would consider giving up some of your formal power as a founder?
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