Comment by kagakuninja

I've been at 2 companies acquired by private equity firms. In one case, the company was totally healthy in the niche market of software for libraries. The company was sold because the owner wanted to retire.

The vampire capitalists did the standard playbook:

  leveraged buyout.  
  transfer debt to the once healthy company.  
  extract yearly management fees.  
  fire and/or encourage many employees to leave.  
  shift maintenance to low cost foreign outsourcing company.    
  skimp on R&D and customer support.  

In the short term, profits go up. Long term, the once healthy company slowly dies, as customers get pissed to the point they are willing to incur the cost of transitioning to a new vendor.

Not only was this company once healthy, it had astonishing employee retention. We are talking many programmers and support people with 20+ years of specialized knowledge. People seem to forget how much productivity is lost with high turnover.