[Confirmed] GreenValueHost being sold to XFuseSolutions

[TheLinuxBug]

@TheLinuxBug None of the money donated went to this. Actually, that paid off like a month or 2 of my bills. 

To settle the issues with how I got money to do this... I've made some really good deals lately, great sales and large local contracts. This gives me the ability to do a few things that I wouldn't normally be able to do. What most of you guys do not know is that GreenValueHost is semi profitable. The money management just wasn't there and too much money was spent on things that it shouldn't have been. 

I am sorry, but this just doesn't cut it.  You're a part of these communities and as such many donated money to you to assist you because you couldn't afford to take care of your self.  Regardless of how you spent the money, the implication here is that you obviously are not sound of thought if you believe investing in GVH is a good use of whatever funds you have.  Simply put, people don't want to feel like they donated to you so that you could turn around and make poor business decisions like this one.  I don't even know you and it bothers me just thinking about it as it seems a very poor use of resources.

Say what you will to make it so you can live with your self, but bottom line here is if you went to a financial institution to borrow money for such a deal, they would laugh you right out the door.

Maybe I sound like the asshole here, but it hurts my brain when people don't consider how their actions look to others, and in this case it looks like you have failed to do that at all.

In the end it is your business and really it doesn't matter what I say because you obviously have already made your decision, however, there is either something else you are not telling us about this transaction that sweetens the deal or.... this whole thing just sounds like a poor business decision. As I stated earlier, good money after bad money.

If you guys are trying to help out Jon, he would be better helped to see GVH go out of business and to get a real job working for a real company where he can learn how to interact with people in a real business environment and learn to make more mature decisions when working with people, in general.  Most of the issue here is the kid only thinks he knows what he is doing and keeps failing to be able to handle issues in a mature way.  A little time in a real job would help to smooth the edges and teach him the skills he needs.  This must be obvious to @drmike or I would hope he wouldn't have thrown his hat in the ring to begin with.  

In the end I really have nothing personal invested in this, so I could truly give a crap about what you decide to do with GVH.  However, if you are doing this to help Jon, HELP HIM, don't keep encouraging this mess.  Give him a job where he can learn the right way to deal with people instead of just giving him the easy way out by taking things over.  You don't learn by someone else fixing your mistakes and that is exactly what it looks like your doing.

my 2 cents.

Cheers!

 

[drmike]

... In the end it is your business and really it doesn't matter what I say because you obviously have already made your decision, however, there is either something else you are not telling us about this transaction that sweetens the deal or.... this whole thing just sounds like a poor business decision. As I stated earlier, good money after bad money.

If you guys are trying to help out Jon, he would be better helped to see GVH go out of business and to get a real job working for a real company where he can learn how to interact with people in a real business environment and learn to make more mature decisions when working with people, in general.  

Most of the issue here is the kid only thinks he knows what he is doing and keeps failing to be able to handle issues in a mature way.  A little time in a real job would help to smooth the edges and teach him the skills he needs.  This must be obvious to @drmike or I would hope he wouldn't have thrown his hat in the ring to begin with.  

GVH Financials

So the financials on this certainly are just as wonky as GVH was as anyone can rightly imagine.  Things will be realigned, that is to say bigger nodes in spots and dealing with repetitive head banging customers, and stupid as a case-study usage.   Some shed will happen from that, but majority of customers get better out of the experience.  Like we all know, small percentage of users that are intentionally PITA, but they ruin entire nodes for the rest of customers.

Jonny Growing and Real Life Experiences

As far as helping Jon out, this whole thing isn't to help him directly out.   When I originally started talking to Jon was back when he originally went emo and people were concerned about the kid.   Folks asked me to step up and do outreach.   So I've dealt with his low points. That was directly about him.

Jonny gets what his mistakes have been and where he should have stopped behavior, or stopped chopping cents off of sales or plugging 100TB into an offer.

This is an exit for Jon.   He's free to go do whatever, but he won't be repeating the same skits.  He can't rightly go back to the well he poisoned and he can't go setting up competitive shop with competing products for one year.  Rightly, he can go do shared hosting or  email hosting or selling cutesy stuff via Etsy.  

Get a Job Kid

I've recommended the real life experience and job thing many times.  I am a big fan of apprenticeships.   I think Jonny would excel with proper in real life mentoring, and actually working alongside someone with high level of understanding.  Problem is in this segment and with remote working is that there are not many apprenticeship opportunities.  Pursue traditional in real life route and he's headed out of what he knows / has interest in, hosting (yes, I hear all of your applause).  But when he becomes of age (18) these things become more possible and likely.

 

[XFS_Duke]

@TheLinuxBug

I am sorry, but this just doesn't cut it.  Your a part of these communities and as such many donated money to you to assist you because you couldn't afford to take care of your self.  Regardless of how you spent the money, the implication here is that you obviously are not sound of thought if you believe investing in GVH is a good use of whatever funds you have.  Simply put, people don't want to feel like they donated to you so that you could turn around and make poor business decisions like this one.  I don't even know you and it bothers me just thinking about it as it seems a very poor use of resources

I'm not of sound thought because I want to take care of the customers that are getting hammered and screwed over by GVH? To be perfectly honest, most of the customers that know about this already from these forums are happy about it and ready for it to happen. Plus, as I said before, my personal life and my business are two separate things. I don't use my personal money for my business and don't use business money for my personal things. What was donated to me I considered personal money. I bought food, kept the light on at my home and spent money on my kids for stuff they needed. Remember, I had a newborn son prior to the wreck. What you see as a very poor use of resources are an easy way to ensure customers stability and the resources that they need.

Say what you will to make it so you can live with your self, but bottom line here is if you went to a financial institution to borrow money for such a deal, they would laugh you right out the door.

Sad part about this is that you really don't know what was going on. What do you think is so bad about GVH? lol

Maybe I sound like the asshole here, but it hurts my brain when people don't consider how their actions look to others, and in this case it looks like you have failed to do that at all.

You said it, I didn't.

In the end it is your business and really it doesn't matter what I say because you obviously have already made your decision, however, there is either something else you are not telling us about this transaction that sweetens the deal or.... this whole thing just sounds like a poor business decision. As I stated earlier, good money after bad money.

There is nothing else to say. The only other thing is the financial part of it that doesn't need to be released. However, I will say that I received a decent deal.

If you guys are trying to help out Jon, he would be better helped to see GVH go out of business and to get a real job working for a real company where he can learn how to interact with people in a real business environment and learn to make more mature decisions when working with people, in general.  Most of the issue here is the kid only thinks he knows what he is doing and keeps failing to be able to handle issues in a mature way.  A little time in a real job would help to smooth the edges and teach him the skills he needs.  This must be obvious to @drmike or I would hope he wouldn't have thrown his hat in the ring to begin with.  

I can't control GVH, I can only control the assets and contractual obligations that Jonny has to meet, which includes a Non-Compete, NDA, Sale Agreements and things such as that. Jonny may get a real job, however, the offer is out there for him to get a real job with me and learn things.

 

[RLT]

Less then you spend on food for a month is what I believe you said on let. That would certainly put a new angle on it.

 

[tonyg]

Maybe I sound like the asshole

Yes.

 

[MannDude]

So, once again, what does Lance (the actual GVH owner) get out of all of this?

Jonny was just a school boy front man and not the owner, and a minor who can't legally sign contracts anyway. So I would imagine that Duke and Lance are making the deal... or... ?

 

[XFS_Duke]

So, once again, what does Lance (the actual GVH owner) get out of all of this?

Jonny was just a school boy front man and not the owner, and a minor who can't legally sign contracts anyway. So I would imagine that Duke and Lance are making the deal... or... ?

Lance allows Jonathan to do whatever he wants to with the company. Jonny's parents are going to sign along with him on the contracts. Each state's contract law is a little different, however, if it's something that he cannot sign, his parents can co-sign for him and it makes it legal. While Lance is the technical owner of GVH, he really just wants everything to go right and he believes this is the right way. He gave Jonathan all the power to sell off assets or the whole company itself. I believe that this is the best possible scenario for the customers of GVH and I know they'll be fine and I believe that they know everything will be ok. Just today, I've had emails, texts (how the hell they got my cell phone number, i'll never know), skype messages and tickets opened under XFuse about it. Every single one was happy about it. I've even had a lot of people asking for jobs. That'll be handled soon as well.

 

[HalfEatenPie]

So...  tldr Lance was the guy who put everything under his name and took all the legal risks while Johnny went around and screwed everyone?

 

[Epidrive]

So...  tldr Lance was the guy who put everything under his name and took all the legal risks while Johnny went around and screwed everyone?

Wasnt that obvious all the time?

 

[HalfEatenPie]

Wasnt that obvious all the time?

I mean at least now it's confirmed.  Before that it was only suspected.  Sucks the guy's on the line legally for Johnny's screw ups.  

 

[splitice]

I wish XFuseSolutions the best of luck. Sounds like you have some real work ahead of you.

 

[drmike]

Wonder who the next drama company will be?


I feel sorry for duke with the mess a lot of jons customers will most likely leave.

Do we need another drama company?  Been quite a few of them, but GVH is up there as a legend.  Probably the most visible since CVPS did it's day in the sun.  Before it went drama light.

Being optimistic, but I am hoping for fewer stupid entries into the market.  Usually the market naturally prunes new stupid entrants at a box or two in size.

I am seeing the end of the IPv4 land grab too which will take interest out and usefulness of companies like GVH away.  That should stem the tide of 12 IPs per container and those 45 cents a month IPv4 plans.

 

[Sam]

Jonny gets what his mistakes have been and where he should have stopped behavior, or stopped chopping cents off of sales or plugging 100TB into an offer.

Among other repeated mistakes Jon literally did 100TB offers twice. He didn't learn. He might have if GVH had been allowed to continue to it's foregone conclusion. He just isn't ethical which is the fundamental issue. 

I personally don't see how this deal benefits anybody.

 

[GS-Dylan]

Well that was a real interesting read. I've been out of hosting for a couple years got back in this year so I missed GVH just catching the tail end of it and I've seen my share of oversold fly by night companies that cant sustain at their prices, but as stated in this thread GVH is of legendary status when coming to this.

I'd find it hard to believe taking over GVH's customers on already oversold hardware with no profit to minimal profit and adding more hardware is going to net you much but I haven't seen there financials directly so I don't know. Possibly trimming the fat and dropping some of the problem customers could work. Maybe they'll trim down some of the crazy insane deal packages that got purchased to more reasonable packages, or drop the customer all together. Either way I see the client base shrinking significantly, as stated before customers who are there want cheap and don't really care about quality. They'd rather have the 100tb and never use it and have downtime than purchase a realistic package for more from a reputable company. I will say in the past I've picked up customers from companies similar to GVH and they turned out to be awesome, they've been to hell and back and if you show them a good home and reliable service they tend to be overly satisfied and quite loyal.

 

[XFS_Duke]

@GS-Dylan, that is exactly what I'm going for here. Believe me, GVH as a whole would have paid a whole lot more for servers than I will with ColoCrossing or any other provider I bring into the loop.

 

[Aldryic C'boas]

I really don't see anything inherently noble about any of this crap.  Saving the customers?  Sounds pretty bogus to me, especially when said customers would save themselves by finding a decent company to purchase from once GVH crashed and burned.

Lance allows Jonathan to do whatever he wants to with the company. Jonny's parents are going to sign along with him on the contracts.

You'd best *hope* that you get Lances signatures on anything.  Jonny himself is a minor, and was never in a position to decide legal matters for the company - regardless of whether or not he had mommy and daddy holding his hand.

This is more trying to save the cancer out of a dying dog, just to move the cancer to another dog.  A PR stunt at best, with no real consideration for the dogs involved.

 

[MannDude]

This is more trying to save the cancer out of a dying dog, just to move the cancer to another dog.  A PR stunt at best, with no real consideration for the dogs involved.

 

[drmike]

1. I really don't see anything inherently noble about any of this crap.  Saving the customers?  Sounds pretty bogus to me, especially when said customers would save themselves by finding a decent company to purchase from once GVH crashed and burned.

2. You'd best *hope* that you get Lances signatures on anything.  Jonny himself is a minor, and was never in a position to decide legal matters for the company - regardless of whether or not he had mommy and daddy holding his hand.

1.  From the people that brought you SAVE THE CHILDREN.... Oh wait, wrong commercial. 

People paid for service and under failedcos they get ditched and buried.  So in this they are getting what they paid for, in theory.  That benefits that subset of customers.  As you can rightly assume, GVH has fair share of long commit buy-ins.  About the customers? Sure it is, right after being about the business as whole pile first.

2.  The contract includes Jonny and a legal guardian (parent), Lance and Duke.

 

[DomainBop]

I really don't see anything inherently noble about any of this crap.  Saving the customers?  Sounds pretty bogus to me, especially when said customers would save themselves by finding a decent company to purchase from once GVH crashed and burned.

From LET, in response to customers with unsustainable plans:

Duke said "However, those plans will be honored until the renewal, then those plans will be phased out."

Duke said "Let's say that you have one of those ridiculous unsustainable plans. When it comes up for renewal, like your next due date, your plan will be changed to something that is more in line with the price that you pay. If you do not want that plan, so be it. However, you will have the options for a more sustainable plan at a normal price."

Duke said "unsustainable plans means anything without a normal bandwidth allocation, IP allocation, disk space or anything remotely close to $3/year. Anything with 10GB ram+ also. I'll deal with each client on these plans individually so that we can gauge what everyone is using and what they need."

That description of unsustainable describes the majority of GVH VPS plans.

I don't see much benefit for the majority of customers from the acquisition, but as this LET poster said, the deal does have potentially great benefits for the relatively unknown XFS/Duke who just a few months ago (August) was having financial problems and voiced concerns about being able to pay his company's bills:

iwaswrongonce "While I don't think this makes sense from a pure M&A perspective, XFuse_Duke already said he spent more on groceries last month than on the GVH customer base. So we're talking small peanuts here. From a purely marketing perspective, this is worth whatever he paid. I had never heard of XFuse before. Now everyone has, and everyone will certainly be curious what the GVH replacement plans will be. This is the type of visibility that is hard to generate overnight. He basically gets to piggyback on GVH's antics across LE*/VPSB/WHT without having to actually get his hands dirty, and can potentially even come off as a savior to some. Will it be a headache for him? Most definitely. But there are dozens of people who would love to have this much exposure. There is no such thing as bad publicity. GVH proved that."

August "Currently I am stuck in a chair with hardly no income and barely able to squeak by paying my bills. Unfortunately this brings forth other issues to which I have no answers. My company. Throughout all the pain that I am in with what they call "drop foot", my biggest concern is getting everything paid for my house and my business.:"

Back to the GVH customers:

Duke said: Just so everyone knows, the vps, shared and dedicated servers are coming along with me.

I don't see any mention of the resellers there...hopefully they won't be thrown under the bus for the umpteenth time in the past year.

My personal feeling is if the plans aren't going to be renewed the customers aren't really receiving any long term benefits from this acquisition, and if GVH had gone under they would have been better off finding a provider who has a longer history of financial stability (rather than one who was in trouble as recently as August but now says they're financially sound...6 months isn't enough time to declare a company golden and out of the woods in my world).

 

[drmike]

I don't see any mention of the resellers there...hopefully they won't be thrown under the bus for the umpteenth time in the past year.

My personal feeling is if the plans aren't going to be renewed the customers aren't really receiving any long term benefits from this acquisition, and if GVH had gone under they would have been better off finding a provider who has a longer history of financial stability (rather than one who was in trouble as recently as August but now says they're financially sound...6 months isn't enough time to declare a company golden and out of the woods in my world).

You know @DomainBop you aren't going to catch any flack from me  I'll respond to these.  Thanks for picking at things.

Resellers - I haven't a clue about those.  Let's just say they haven't been mentioned for some reasons.  Safe to say they probably aren't material to the agreement, so far.

Plans and renewals - plans will be stuck to.  Lived out until renewal.  At renewal time depending on the level of stupidity of the original plan, some buyers might see a larger percentage increase and reduced terms.  In English, pay more and annual prepay isn't justified robbery.  But, that how much more shouldn't scare anyone as it is not going to be punishing. If plans are that out of whack, those might get pruned.   I can see any say 100TB plans that may exist going the way of the dinosaur.

As far as more viable or stable provider doing a buy.... People were asked. Obviously not the entire industry.  No proxied sales offer went up on WHT or anything.  There was one company that showed up yesterday to try to jump in the middle before a contract was official though.  That would have been a bigger mess and dramarama.  Put it this way, dealing with this puts you on line to deal with prior customers who are mixed bag and familiar with a company where slapping equals free stuff (extortion) aka please don't go posting bad about GVH.    Plus where ticket volume can be deafening for a multitude of reasons, none of which would have had GVH winning Customer Support company of 2015.