[HN Gopher] Samsara S-1
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Samsara S-1
 
Author : finolex1
Score  : 73 points
Date   : 2021-11-26 18:28 UTC (4 hours ago)
 
web link (www.sec.gov)
w3m dump (www.sec.gov)
 
| moltenguardian wrote:
| The best piece of advice I heard for reading financial reports:
| start at the bottom, read your way up. All the juicy stuff is
| hidden in the bottom (like losses), while the pretty,
| extrapolated ARR graphs are up at the top.
 
| hazemotes wrote:
| Samsara, in both Buddhism and Hinduism, is something to be
| escaped. The connotation is either downright negative or at least
| sobering. Why name your company this?
 
  | lordleft wrote:
  | I'm Indian and I had the exact same reaction. It's like naming
  | your company Dukka. Or maybe it's more like the Sanskrit Maya,
  | which I suppose is not a completely negative term (but can be
  | in certain Indian philosophical-theological discourses).
  | 
  | EDIT: My mother just pointed out to me that Samsara can also
  | mean "talk", which is exactly what it means in my native
  | language, malayalam. I've just never seen it spelt out that
  | way. If that's the meaning they're going for, it's actually
  | quite apt!
 
    | Tzeak wrote:
    | It could be the "rebirth" of the Meraki platform - I don't
    | think the cofounders are malayali so while a Malayalam word
    | seems more apt, i think it's less likely.
 
  | erie wrote:
  | In Arabic too, it means trying to mediate to get commission.
 
  | globalise83 wrote:
  | Once you IPO your material worries are gone and you can move
  | into the next circle.
 
  | erulabs wrote:
  | > Samsara (sNsaar) is a Sanskrit/Pali word that means "world"
  | 
  | I am not a Buddhist, but is "the world" something to be
  | "escaped"? I can't find a matching definition for it to imply
  | escape.
 
    | danvayn wrote:
    | The physical world, yeah.
    | 
    | The specific aim or mission depends on the school, but the
    | focus in Buddhism is always on escaping duhka
    | ('modern/societal ills') in an attempt to break or transcend
    | the cycle.
 
    | ottomanbob wrote:
    | In buddhism, "the world" is material, personal, and full of
    | suffering. It is something to let go.
 
      | ethbr0 wrote:
      | Doesn't this accurately describe IoT implementations?
      | 
      | You're looking at transcending the physical, while
      | simultaneously being trapped by and having to deal with its
      | messy realities.
      | 
      | Seems a pretty apt metaphor.
 
    | stewbrew wrote:
    | Maybe, some people prefer nirvana.
 
    | crdrost wrote:
    | Samsara is not just "world"... The etymology is Sam/Sara,
    | "through/motion" and the idea is that it refers to an endless
    | going-through-the-motions, an endless cycle of dying, and re-
    | dying, and being reborn as a slug and suffering as slugs do,
    | and re-dying, and being reborn as a human and suffering as
    | humans do, and re-dying, and being reborn as a god and
    | suffering as gods do,and re-dying. You've "been there done
    | that" for anything that you now think is some great
    | aspiration for this life.
    | 
    | A proper translation of "Samsara, Inc." might be "Weariness,
    | Inc." or "Ennui, Inc." ... It's not just the world, but the
    | world with specific reference to this way that everyone is
    | just going through the motions.
 
    | cko wrote:
    | > 153. Through many a birth in samsara have I wandered in
    | vain, seeking the builder of this house (of life). Repeated
    | birth is indeed suffering!
    | 
    | https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/dhp.11.budd..
    | ..
    | 
    | I happen to have this as a tattoo actually. A relic from my
    | Buddhist days.
 
  | shoto_io wrote:
  | Read this thread carefully and you'll understand. It's
  | marketing genius.
  | 
  | I wouldn't have remember the name of the company. But thanks to
  | you and your fellows here I will. I can even tell a story
  | around it.
 
  | ottomanbob wrote:
  | Yes, kind of baffling name choice? I suspect they totally
  | misunderstood the concept as a replenishing / refreshing cycle
  | rather than the self-perpetuating nature of suffering.
 
    | omarfarooq wrote:
    | Or perhaps they are more to privvy to the depth and flavor of
    | Buddhism than the average HN commentor. Nagarjuna says that
    | samsara is nirvana and nirvana is samsara.
    | 
    | Similarly, Saraha says: "Here in this body are the sacred
    | rivers: here are the sun and moon as well as all the
    | pilgrimage places... I have not encountered another temple as
    | blissful as my own body."
    | 
    | In short, the gravy is all gravy.
 
  | throwawaysea wrote:
  | Per Wikipedia
  | (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sa%E1%B9%83s%C4%81ra):
  | 
  | > Popularly, it is the cycle of death and rebirth.
  | 
  | Maybe it is because there is a "popular" definition that the
  | casual observer wouldn't interpret as something to be escaped?
  | Western audiences often borrow words and concepts from other
  | cultures, that often have deep meaning behind them, and reduce
  | them to some shallow commercial one-liner that their audiences
  | can latch onto.
  | 
  | I guess I have a different question about a company picking
  | such a name - is it appropriate ethically? It feels like
  | they've co-opted a term that has a particular cultural and
  | religious meaning, will probably mispronounce it in all their
  | marketing, will popularize a shallow understanding of this term
  | rather than the deeper source material (as has happened with
  | terms like karma, yoga, and other such popularized terms of
  | Hindu origin), and also place a trademark on something that has
  | always existed as a free to use concept. I recognize that one
  | of the founders is Indian, but it still doesn't sit well with
  | me.
 
  | galaxyLogic wrote:
  | > Samsara, in both Buddhism and Hinduism, is something to be
  | escaped
  | 
  | In other words it is something you have to deal with, you can't
  | just ignore it. It is not something to be ignored. A company
  | that helps us deal with Samsara is great.
  | 
  | And here if it is IoT and makes it easier to deal with "things"
  | it allows us to escape the trouble of managing them.
 
  | yumraj wrote:
  | Samsara, more like Sansar (sNsaar) means World. One _may_ want
  | to escape the world but there is no negative connotation that I
  | 'm aware of.
  | 
  | I'm a Hindu and speak Hindi.
 
    | nsenifty wrote:
    | Samsara is the correct Sanskrit (more like Samskrta)
    | pronunciation and the original meaning is the endless birth
    | and death cycle caused by attachment.
    | 
    | The Hindi vernacular Sansaar indeed means the physical world
    | just like Samsara in Kannada (and other Southern languages?)
    | means Family. Both the world and family are due to
    | attachment.
 
  | [deleted]
 
| rueynshard wrote:
| Samsara's founders also previously started and sold Meraki to
| Cisco for $1.2 billion. Pretty rare to have founded 2 unicorns in
| ~15 years.
 
| larrywright wrote:
| I've never heard of them EXCEPT for the fact that for months I
| saw their ads before every video I watched on Youtube. I kept
| wondering why I was seeing them because it's a product that I
| clearly have no use for.
 
  | missedthecue wrote:
  | Ive always wondered why companies do that. I've gotten adverts
  | for Airbus and Lockheed Martin but I can assure you I am in no
  | position to buy a fighter jet.
 
    | vultour wrote:
    | Are you in Washington DC? I heard the ads around there can
    | get wild.
 
    | robryan wrote:
    | Some of it is about improving their public perception. We get
    | a bunch of ads in Australia from mining companies trying to
    | let everyone know they are digging up materials for renewable
    | projects and not just coal.
 
    | DevKoala wrote:
    | Maybe bad targeting or perhaps brand recognition. The
    | conversion model works. It is about convincing as many
    | individuals this is a reputable company so that when the
    | person signing the check asks around nobody bats an eye.
 
  | lalos wrote:
  | Improve brand awareness pre-IPO, it's like clockwork.
 
| bradleyjg wrote:
| Another case of a company "going public" but insiders retaining
| total control. I guess we'll have to wait for the next market
| crash to get rid of these fake public companies.
 
  | JumpCrisscross wrote:
  | > _we'll have to wait for the next market crash to get rid of
  | these fake public companies_
  | 
  | Given the lack of evidence for founder-controlled companies
  | underperforming the market, I wouldn't hold my breath.
  | Particularly if the business is not reliant on outside capital
  | ( _e.g._ Uber under Kalanick, who was ousted despite having
  | super-voting privileges).
 
    | bradleyjg wrote:
    | https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=492353
 
  | ttul wrote:
  | A significant number of publicly traded companies -- and not
  | just new ones in tech - are tightly controlled by founding
  | shareholders who have special shares. This is not an unusual
  | practice even for public companies.
  | 
  | I don't think there's anything wrong with taking your company
  | public and retaining troll through special shares. Anyone who
  | is able to do that massive built a pretty great company,
  | otherwise the market would not support it.
 
    | bradleyjg wrote:
    | > Anyone who is able to do that massive built a pretty great
    | company, otherwise the market would not support it.
    | 
    | In a normal market, I suspect many of these would not be
    | supported, or would at least have to take a big discount to
    | PE. But we are in the era when money pours into doge coin.
    | You can't conclude anything in such an environment.
 
| mushufasa wrote:
| that's a really impressive growth rate and amount of revenue.
| never heard of them!
 
  | finolex1 wrote:
  | Their main customers are in blue-collar industries (transport,
  | utilities, etc.), so they are pretty unknown outside that
  | world.
 
| Invictus0 wrote:
| I listened to Sanjit speak at HackMIT several years ago. He is a
| really brilliant man and a real innovator. I'll definitely be
| investing in this IPO.
 
| sjaak wrote:
| There is a beautiful movie by the same name. Go see it if you
| haven't!
| 
| https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0770802/
 
| davedx wrote:
| My quick stab at FA:
| 
| Pros
| 
| - Revenue growth and gross margins are really impressive
| 
| - Big sales and marketing spend that seems to be effective at
| growing top line
| 
| - Costs under control - loss from operations decreasing with an
| obvious path to profitability while still scaling up very fast
| 
| Cons
| 
| - "We face intense and increasing competition", combined with
| 
| - $55B total addressable market
| 
| Assume Samsara manages to reach 20% market share of this market,
| that means they will be able to grow a maximum of 20x after IPO.
| Compare this with TSLA who had $15M and grew to $31B (2000x).
| Probably not the best comparison, and TAM is growing too, but it
| makes me wonder how much further this company can grow? And at
| this growth rate? It is quite a niche industry (IoT).
 
  | throwawaysea wrote:
  | It also notes a 21% CAGR from 2021-2024 for the TAM, so their
  | growth ceiling may be higher than it looks initially.
 
| nicolashahn wrote:
| Interviewed with them back in 2017. Was very impressed with what
| they were doing and the apparent talent of their team. Didn't get
| an offer because I hadn't leetcoded enough but left a good
| impression on me.
 
  | atian wrote:
  | Having interacted with members from Samsara's team
  | nonprofessionally, I also hold them in high regard.
 
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