Closing your company
What a closed company's data has actually sold for
The business has closed, and you are wondering whether its email, Slack and code justify the work. No standard price list exists.
The evidence: a few reported deals, the usual range at one shutdown service, and a single big bankruptcy auction. Listed below in order of size.
In this guide
01
Reported prices
Crypto startup, about 2.5 years old
What sold
Code base
Price
About $25,000, with about $15,000 more for workspace data pending
SimpleClosure's 150+ deals
What sold
Code and workspace data
Price
Typically $10K to $100K
cielo24
What sold
13 years of Slack, Jira and email
Price
Reported as hundreds of thousands of dollars
Spirit Airlines (bankruptcy)
What sold
About 100M emails, Teams, files
Price
Google $10.0M winning bid, pending approval
| Case | What sold | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Crypto startup, about 2.5 years old | Code base | About $25,000, with about $15,000 more for workspace data pending |
| SimpleClosure's 150+ deals | Code and workspace data | Typically $10K to $100K |
| cielo24 | 13 years of Slack, Jira and email | Reported as hundreds of thousands of dollars |
| Spirit Airlines (bankruptcy) | About 100M emails, Teams, files | Google $10.0M winning bid, pending approval |
For most companies that are closing, SimpleClosure's range is the realistic planning number.
02
What moves you up the ladder
- Years of history. cielo24's 13 years sold for far more than a 2.5-year startup.
- People. More staff at peak means more written down.
- Range of tools. Chat, email, tickets and code together beat one source alone.
- Clean scoping. Sensitive HR and health records left out up front.
03
Consumer data is a different market
Sales like 23andMe ($305M) and Zulily ($4.5M) involved customer databases sold with a brand. They are not a guide to what a work archive fetches. See customer data in bankruptcy.
For a rough range for your own company, try what your data is worth.
FAQ
Questions, answered
How much is a closed startup's data worth?
Most reported deals run $10K to $100K. A long history or a large team can push it into the hundreds of thousands.
Can code sell on its own?
Yes. MIT Technology Review reports that a small crypto startup received roughly $25,000 for its codebase.
See what your data could be worth
A rough range from published deals and buyer price bands, based on headcount and years of records.
Keep reading
Sources
Every number on this page links back to one of these.
- 1MIT Technology Review: AI labs are buying data from dead startups (13 Oct 2026)technologyreview.com
- 2SimpleClosure: what your startup's assets are worthsimpleclosure.com
- 3AI Weekly: Mercor chases shuttered startups' Slack and Jira archivesaiweekly.co
- 4Forbes: AI's new training data is your old work Slacks and emails (16 Apr 2026)forbes.com
- 5Chapter11Cases (Stretto): docket report on the Spirit Airlines de-identified data salechapter11cases.com
- 6Bloomberg Law: Google aims to boost AI with purchase of Spirit Airlines datanews.bloomberglaw.com
- 7Skift: the list of objections to Spirit's data sale keeps growing (12 Oct 2026)skift.com
- 8WBTV: Anne Wojcicki's nonprofit gets court approval to buy 23andMe for $305Mwbtv.com
- 9Retail Dive: Beyond acquires Zulily's brand and assetsretaildive.com
- 10Pewter Datapewterdata.com
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