It&#x27;s not just the exercise price... it&#x27;s the taxes on the illiquid gains that really fsck you!  Eg. you&#x27;re granted $100k in options over four years. You want to depart the company now, when the shares are worth 100x.  You pay your $100k to the company to exercise, but now you also owe taxes on $9.9M in gains -- and you can&#x27;t sell any of that stock to pay the $3.3M in taxes to the IRS.<p>With a 10-year option, hopefully the company gets (or can offer) some liquidity to help you pay the IRS when you exercise later.