Is there any reason why you think that the billion dollars will "trickle down" to the people who would have enjoyed the benefits of the merger?

Sure, your hypothetical payout sounds good, especially assuming they don't have to give up anything, but it's still hypothetical and I doubt that anything close to what you described is going to happen with that billion dollars.

All of their rounds have added up to $333M; most of that is in the past 3-5 years; the early investment rounds were very tiny. $500M on $333M isn't the home run that the investors were looking for, but maybe in today's environment may be the best they can hope for. That said, they may not want to set that precedent.

I didn't realize they had a breakup fee. That's is kinda nice.