Book · How it goes wrong
Super Pumped
Mike Isaac · 2019
A reported account of Uber under its founding chief executive — governance failure at a company that, unlike most on this shelf, survived.
Why it is here
This is the governance book on the list. It describes what happens when a board cannot or will not constrain a founder, how investor protections work in practice when they are finally invoked, and what a boardroom fight over control actually looks like.
The angel-relevant material is about the terms our governance section describes in the abstract: board composition, protective provisions, voting agreements. This is what they look like when they matter, and the distance between having a right and being able to exercise it is the whole story.
It is also a reminder that governance failure does not necessarily destroy a company. Uber survived, changed leadership and listed — which makes it a more nuanced case than the outright collapses either side of it here.
Read it if
You want to understand what board control means when it is actually contested.
Skip it if
You are looking for an even-handed portrait of the people involved — it is not that.
What it explains