Complete Autopsy Archive: Cases #021, #092, #055
Forensic cross-examination of $2 Billion+ in cumulative startup equity evaporation. Telemetry audit covering AI model parity shocks, subsidized FinTech unit-economics collapses, and enterprise WebGL architecture paralysis.
• Fatal Metric: Churn > 13.68%
• Outcome: 0.82x LTV:CAC Inversion
• Fatal Metric: 200x Burn-to-Revenue
• Outcome: $124.5M Total Evaporation
• Fatal Metric: 8.91% Real Paid Density
• Outcome: $1.9B to Liquidation
COPYGENIUS AI: THE NEGATIVE CHURN SPIRAL
The fatal assumption was treating temporary model context limits (4K) as a defensible moat. When foundation models released native 128K context and API embeddings, customer willingness to pay evaporated overnight.
| PLAN | PRICE | INFERENCE (GPT-3.5) | INFERENCE (GPT-4T) | NET CM1 MARGIN |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | $19.00/mo | $0.417 [2.2%] | $1.78 [9.4%] | 84.5% ($16.05) |
| Premium | $39.00/mo | $1.251 [3.2%] | $5.13 [13.2%] | 86.4% ($33.70) |
• Pre-Shock: CAC $25 | Churn 4% | LTV $475 | LTV:CAC = 7.60x
• Parity Shock: CAC $58 | Churn 25% | LTV $64 | LTV:CAC = 1.22x [Bleed]
• Terminal: Churn 35% | LTV $45.80 | LTV:CAC = 0.82x [Net Capital Destruction]
FAST.CO: THE $10M/MO CAPITAL INCINERATION
Management announced an $8 Billion merchant pipeline, but captured only $50 Million in actual 2021 transaction volume (a 0.625% conversion rate). Massive capital was funneled into NASCAR and sports sponsorships while custom enterprise builds failed to complete.
• Registration CAC: $700,000 / 50,000 users = $14.00 per registration.
• Network Conversion: Only 6% completed a 3rd-party merchant checkout (3,000 users).
• Realized Activated CAC = $700,000 / 3,000 = $233.00 (16x CAC Inversion).
INVISIONAPP: ANATOMY OF A $1.9B ENTERPRISE ZERO
InVision’s revenue came from designer uploads. When Figma shifted design to real-time browser canvas (WebGL), InVision spent 4 years rewriting their legacy ColdFusion backend while building a heavy desktop Electron app.
• InVision Model: 10 Designers + 90 Free Viewers = $200/mo ARR ($2.00/user/mo).
• Expanded Surface (Figma): 10 Designers + 20 Devs + 10 PMs + 60 Viewers = $1,100/mo ARR ($11.00/user/mo).
• Density Expansion: Figma extracted 5.5x more revenue from identical team sizes.
SR = [CM1 / Monthly Churn] / CAC. If SR < 1.0, halt paid distribution immediately. Every newly acquired subscriber destroys enterprise value.
GPBM = Net Cash Burn / Net New Realized Gross Profit. If GPBM > 3.5x for two quarters, enact an immediate hiring freeze and tie R&D strictly to merchant TPV.
RCR = New Architecture ARR Added / Legacy ARR Churned. If RCR < 0.75, immediately terminate multi-year rewrites and initiate an asset sale while commercial leverage remains.