What Famous Companies Sold For
Instagram, YouTube, WhatsApp, Pixar, Marvel, Slack and more: who bought them, when and for how much.
Last updated November 6, 2026
How much did Instagram sell for? What did Google pay for YouTube? They are common questions, and the headline numbers often hide a detail. Deals paid in stock moved with the buyer’s share price, and some famous prices were never officially disclosed.
The table lists the sales in our archive, from the largest to the smallest. Figures are as reported at the time and are not adjusted for inflation. Each row links to the full story, where the sources are listed.
The sales, largest first
| Company | Buyer | Year | Price | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elon Musk | 2022 | $44B | $54.20 a share. In 2025 Musk’s AI company xAI acquired X in an all-stock deal valuing it at $33 billion plus $12 billion of debt. | |
| Arm | SoftBank | 2016 | about £24B ($32B) | About $32 billion at the time. A later $40 billion sale to Nvidia was abandoned in 2022, and Arm returned to the stock market in 2023 at a $54.5 billion valuation. |
| Slack | Salesforce | 2021 | $27.7B | Agreed in December 2020, completed in July 2021. |
| 2014 | $19B | $4 billion in cash, $12 billion in shares and $3 billion in restricted stock. Worth about $22 billion when it closed. | ||
| Sealed Air (Bubble Wrap) | Clayton, Dubilier & Rice | 2026 | $10.3B | All cash, $42.15 a share. Completed on April 9, 2026. |
| Pixar | Disney | 2006 | $7.4B | All in Disney stock, or about $6.3 billion after Pixar’s own cash. Steve Jobs had paid $10 million in 1986. |
| Nokia’s phone business | Microsoft | 2013 | €5.44B (about $7.2B) | Including a ten-year patent license. In 2015 Microsoft took a $7.6 billion charge on the business. |
| Tetra Pak (half the company) | Gad Rausing | 1995 | about $7B | Hans Rausing sold his 50% stake to his brother, as reported by Bloomberg. |
| Yahoo (core business) | Verizon | 2017 | $4.48B | Cut by $350 million after Yahoo disclosed two huge data breaches. In 2008 Yahoo had rejected $44.6 billion from Microsoft. |
| Bloomberg L.P. (20% stake) | Bloomberg Inc. | 2008 | $4.43B | Merrill Lynch sold its last 20%. Only about $110 million was paid in cash; most of the rest came as notes. |
| Marvel | Disney | 2009 | about $4B | $30 a share in cash plus about 0.745 Disney shares. Marvel had filed for bankruptcy in 1996. |
| YouTube | 2006 | $1.65B | All in Google stock, for a site about 20 months old. | |
| Spanx (majority stake) | Blackstone | 2021 | $1.2B valuation | Sara Blakely had started it with $5,000 and taken no outside money until then. |
| Dollar Shave Club | Unilever | 2016 | $1B (reported) | Reported as all cash. The launch video had cost $4,500. Unilever sold 65% to Nexus Capital in 2023 for an undisclosed price. |
| Domino’s (93% stake) | Bain Capital | 1998 | about $1B | Tom Monaghan had started with a pizza shop bought with about $900 of borrowed money in 1960. |
| 2012 | $1B | $300 million in cash plus about 23 million Facebook shares. Worth about $715 million when it closed. | ||
| Intermix Media (MySpace) | News Corp | 2005 | about $580M | Intermix owned MySpace and about 30 other sites. News Corp sold MySpace in 2011 for about $35 million. |
| Hotmail | Microsoft | 1997 | $400M (reported) | Paid in Microsoft stock, about 18 months after launch. Hotmail had started with $300,000 from Draper Fisher Jurvetson. |
| Ben & Jerry’s | Unilever | 2000 | $326M | $43.60 a share. The founders had started in 1978 with $12,000. |
| Blockbuster (assets) | DISH Network | 2011 | about $320M bid | Bought at a bankruptcy auction. After adjustments DISH paid about $226 million in cash. |
| Kentucky Fried Chicken | Heublein | 1971 | about $285M | Seven years after its owners bought it from Colonel Sanders for $2 million. |
| Liquid Paper | Gillette | 1979 | $47.5M | Plus a royalty on every bottle for its inventor, Bette Nesmith Graham. |
| MySpace | Specific Media | 2011 | about $35M | Mostly in Specific Media stock, six years after News Corp paid about $580 million for its owner. |
| Flickr (Ludicorp) | Yahoo | 2005 | about $25M (reported) | The price was never officially disclosed. |
| The Coca-Cola Company | Ernest Woodruff’s investor group | 1919 | $25M | Asa Candler had assembled the rights for about $2,300 between 1888 and 1891. |
| Tupperware Home Parties | Rexall | 1958 | $16M | The same year Earl Tupper fired Brownie Wise, who built its sales system. She settled for $30,000. |
| Starbucks (six stores) | Howard Schultz’s investor group | 1987 | $3.8M | Bought from its founders with money from local investors. In fiscal 2025 Starbucks had revenue of $37.2 billion. |
| McDonald’s (the brothers’ rights) | Ray Kroc | 1961 | $2.7M | Kroc did not have the money himself. Harry Sonneborn raised it, borrowing from college endowment funds. |
| Kentucky Fried Chicken | John Y. Brown Jr. and Jack C. Massey | 1964 | $2M | Plus a lifetime salary for Harland Sanders, then 73. |
| 86-DOS (all rights) | Microsoft | 1980–81 | $75,000 | $25,000 for a license, then $50,000 for all rights. It became MS-DOS. |
| Apple (a 10% share) | His partners, Jobs and Wozniak | 1976 | $800 | Ronald Wayne gave up his share eleven days after Apple’s founding, and later took $1,500 more to drop any claims. |
How to read these prices
Three things to keep in mind when reading prices like these. First, deals paid in shares change value before they close: Instagram’s $1 billion was worth about $715 million by then, while WhatsApp’s $19 billion grew to about $22 billion. Second, old prices are not adjusted for inflation, so $25 million in 1919 was a far larger sum than it sounds. Third, some famous numbers, like Flickr’s, were never confirmed by the companies.
For the deals that never happened, see the biggest missed opportunities in business history.
Every figure on this page comes from the 28 stories linked above, where the sources are listed. Read how we check them in our editorial standards.