Correction, May 13: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that Luckey had said there weren’t any female founders whose companies had been acquired for $1 billion or more. Luckey said that there weren’t any female founders who had applied to the group chat.
It’s a group chat with “the boys” — but you have to have sold a unicorn to get an invite.
Palmer Luckey says he scored an invite to an exclusive group chat after he sold his virtual-reality startup, Oculus, to Facebook in 2014.
The “B Boys Club” is a private message thread reserved for entrepreneurs who were able to pull off big business deals, Luckey said in a May 6 episode of Peter Diamandis’ “Moonshots” podcast.
“It’s all boys who have sold a company for at least $1 billion,” said Luckey, who sold Oculus for $2 billion.
“That’s the membership criteria, it doesn’t exclude women, women would be allowed, it’s just thus far only boys have applied,” Luckey said.
Based on the criteria laid out by Luckey, there are some notable names in the tech and business world that would be eligible for a “B Boys Club” invitation.
Like Luckey, Instagram founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, as well as WhatsApp founders Jan Koum and Brian Acton, all sold their companies to Facebook, now Meta, for at least $1 billion. A more recent potential addition is Slack cofounder Stewart Butterfield, who sold the platform to Salesforce for $27.7 billion in 2021.
Notable examples of female-founded startups being acquired for $1 billion or more include IT Cosmetics cofounder and CEO Jamie Kern Lima, who sold her brand to beauty giant L’Oréal for $1.2 billion in 2016.
Some of the richest men in the world, however, including Luckey’s old boss, Mark Zuckerberg, don’t make the cut. Despite his reported $216 billion net worth, Zuckerberg wouldn’t qualify because he never sold his company. The same goes for Bill Gates, Sam Altman, and Warren Buffett.
As a decadelong member of the group, Luckey confirmed that the successful businessmen in the thread are indeed talking about money.
Luckey, who’s worth an estimated $2.5 billion after confounding the defense-tech startup Anduril, told Diamandis that he’s tried to “shame” his fellow wealthy founders into doing more with their fortunes.
He said he’s asked the group chat, “Guys, you have so much money. Why are you not doing what you know is the right thing to do with this capital?”
As far as what he means by “the right thing,” according to Luckey, his groupmates should execute their vision of “how the world should be” themselves instead of trusting others, be it employees or nonprofits, to know what to do with their money.
Luckey said he’s managed to change some of his peers’ perspectives on their spending, while others are content with driving vintage race cars. Not all ultrawealthy men aspire to be Batman and use their money to shape the world as they see fit, he said.
“I’m not saying everyone should become a vigilante crime fighter, but why wouldn’t you use your resources to do the thing that you know needs to be done?” Luckey said.
