General Consultant Discussion

Avalara issued this press release today regarding the Marketplace Fairness Act: http://blog.avalara.com/2013/05/07/avalara-provides-resource-following-marketplace-fairness-vote/ They also created a website regarding the act: http://salestaxchanges.com/

I'm glad that Avalara is poised to take advantage of this (though I'm not in total agreement with the circumstances). Maybe they'll get so large they'll buy Sage :) The news (at the end of the link above) that Avalara is partnering with ShopSite is huge too. There a large provider of shopping cart software to many web hosting firms.

They are set, if they were public, I'd be buying them up like crazy

I expect them to be bought very quickly. This is a perfect opportunity for someone who needs their core capabilities and the hook into a recurring revenue model. PS - The only reason Avalara is so attractive is that they price on a recurring revenue basis. If they were just selling one-off licenses would we be that excited at their prospects? It's all about the recurring revenue - and always has been!

That's 1/2, the other half is how government regulation creates a business for them. We all kicked ass in the late 90's thanks to the Y2k scare, not because of our wonderful sales skills. You need to be in the right place at the right time. Now you also see why so many industries and companies spend billions on lobbyists in order to artificially create a better business environment. Do you think Intuit is spending money lobbying for a flat tax for example? Yet look at the the money being spent to push for 'green energy'? I'd bet only 20% of those involved give a rats ass about the environment, the other 80% have investments in technology, services or other resources that would purely benefit by government spending on solar, wind, etc. Al Gore made hundreds of millions thanks to getting into the business of buying & selling carbon credits, while the rest of us lemmings thought he was just being altruistic