Deal Flow as Operational Cost
Bending Spoons
This model makes M&A function less like occasional capital allocation and more like inventory replenishment. Bending Spoons buys apps with existing users, cuts costs hard, raises prices, and ports the product onto its shared stack, but those gains fade if subscribers churn and product freshness slows. To keep total revenue moving up, the company needs a steady stream of new assets that arrive with users, subscription cash flow, and room for the same playbook to run again.
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The mechanics are explicit. The company targets under monetized subscription apps, often cuts 60 to 80% of staff after purchase, and pushes price increases that often exceed 80%. That creates a fast payback logic on each deal, but it also means growth is repeatedly reset by buying the next app rather than compounding from one product getting steadily better over many years.
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The financing now looks built for repeat purchases. By October 2025, Bending Spoons had raised equity at an $11.7B valuation and secured a $2.8B debt package for further R&D and acquisitions. It then moved into larger public company take privates including Vimeo at $1.38B, AOL at $1.5B, and Eventbrite at about $500M, showing that deal flow is becoming a core operating input, not a side activity.
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Comparable buyers highlight the tradeoff. Automattic and Tiny Capital also buy internet software assets, but they are described as keeping more of the original teams and product posture. Bending Spoons is differentiated by deeper centralization onto Spoon Engine and sharper cost cutting, which can lift margins faster but also increases the need for fresh acquisitions if individual apps lose momentum after restructuring.
The next phase is a shift from app rollup to scaled holding company. As larger debt backed deals become normal and the target set expands from mobile apps into video, media, and events, the key question stops being whether one turnaround works and becomes whether the company can keep sourcing underpriced assets faster than portfolio churn erodes the gains from the last wave of acquisitions.