for companies raising 9 figure later-stage rounds? that's not obvious to me
and relevant to this case, often the investor will do a higher valuation (artificially minting a unicorn etc) for optics/vanity reasons, which eats an additional 1+ years of future growth, eliminating the relevance of a discount here
and for folks who many not have followed terms above: investors get preferred shares, with rights over these discounted common shares. These include things like veto rights over acquisitions, first money out ("if $200M raised, no one else sees any $ until that $200M is paid back"), and for high-valuation unicorn rounds, often something like a participation multiple ("guaranteed extra $100M profit, so no one sees anything till $300M paid"), high interest rate on convertible debt portions, etc. So beyond the obvious dilution hit of new investors, there are a lot of these gotchas that trade a bigger bank account for heightened exit value risks to employees.
and relevant to this case, often the investor will do a higher valuation (artificially minting a unicorn etc) for optics/vanity reasons, which eats an additional 1+ years of future growth, eliminating the relevance of a discount here
and for folks who many not have followed terms above: investors get preferred shares, with rights over these discounted common shares. These include things like veto rights over acquisitions, first money out ("if $200M raised, no one else sees any $ until that $200M is paid back"), and for high-valuation unicorn rounds, often something like a participation multiple ("guaranteed extra $100M profit, so no one sees anything till $300M paid"), high interest rate on convertible debt portions, etc. So beyond the obvious dilution hit of new investors, there are a lot of these gotchas that trade a bigger bank account for heightened exit value risks to employees.