Companies are bought and not sold (continued)

Fred Wilson has some good commentary on an earlier post. We seem to agree that at the end of the day if you build a real business with sustainable cash flow, the exit will take care of itself. I seem to have oversimplified the "IPO potential" comment for the sake of keeping my post short. To further explain, my only point regarding "IPO potential" is that using pre-bubble metrics a company cannot go public (for the most part) unless it has already been profitable for at least 2 quarters, have a diversified customer base, and be a leader in its market. In other words, it must be a real business with sustainable cash flow. When I look at making new investments, being able to look like the above within a reasonable time frame is a prerequisite for me. Those are the types of businesses that can be bought and not sold.