IPO Preview: Zoom And Pinterest Get Ready To List

Morning Markets: Pinterest and Zoom are expected to start trading this Thursday. Let’s remind ourselves of what we know.

With Lyft’s shares now trading and the Uber S-1 public, you are probably sick of talking about public offerings. Too bad.

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This week there are two more to keep tabs on, namely the debuts of Pinterest and Zoom.

We’ve written about both firms, so I expect that you are somewhat aware of each, what they do, and their numbers. But it’s been a busy Q2 so far, so let’s remind ourselves of what we know before the pricing dance heats up and the trading starts.

Zoom: Expected To Trade On Thursday

Facts first, I think. Zoom, a video conferencing unicorn, is expected to price this Wednesday and trade this Thursday. The San Jose-based tech company raised just over $160 million as a private company from investors including Sequoia, Emergence, and Horizons Ventures.1

Zoom has generated outsized interest in itself for a business-focused SaaS platform. While companies in its category have notched large, successful exits in recent years, their market category does not always excite the press. Zoom, in contrast, given its rapid growth and GAAP profits (Crunchbase News’s notes on its S-1 are here), is almost a media darling.

The company is currently targeting a $28 to $32 per share price range, pushing its non-diluted and diluted valuations into the $8 billion range at its highest price estimate. Given that Zoom’s January 2017 Series D valued the company at just over $1 billion, the company’s expected public valuation is a multiple on its final private worth.

What’s ahead? Zoom could raise its range, of course, or it could merely pick a price inside its range and go live on the penultimate workday of the week. Either way, we’ll keep you informed.

Pinterest: Expected To Trade On Thursday

Facts again, shall we? Pinterest, a social media giant famous for its board-making users, is expected to price this Wednesday and trade this Thursday. The San Francisco-based tech company raised over $1.5 billion during its life as a private firm, picking up capital from over three dozen investors across a host of rounds. Amongst its investing legions, FirstMark, Bessemer, and a16z were the most frequent backers.

Pinterest’s IPO is long-expected. And given its consumer-forward brand and product, the firm’s debut is picking up attention. When a well-used consumer app does big things with money, it becomes an object of fascination. Twitter and Facebook went through similar straits.

As a business, Pinterest has managed consistent revenue growth and has a workable path to profitability. Both of those facts are expected to support the company’s $15 to $17 per-share IPO price range. At those prices, Pinterest is worth a bit over $10 billion, but less than its final private valuation of $12.35 billion (post-money).

Much was made of that slight discount, including a piece by myself. After some scolding (by Phil Libin, here) I have a slightly different perspective in terms of how negative the company’s valuation slip is; all the same, up would have been better. Perhaps Pinterest will raise its range, provided that its roadshow is going well.

Either way, we are days away from the multi-year interest in Pinterest IPO coming to an end.2

And that’s that. Keep tabs on who has gone public here, and send coffee to Crunchbase’s SF HQ and our Providence outpost.

iStockPhoto/Monsitj