Denver-Based Ping Identity Prices Shares At $15 Per Share

Ping Identity priced its IPO at $15 per share this afternoon, raising $187.5 million in its initial public offering.

The identity management company is slated to start trading on the Nasdaq Thursday under the ticker symbol “PING.” The Denver-based startup initially set a price range of $14 to $16 per share. With its pricing at $15, Ping’s valuation is $1.16 billion (or $1.19 if underwriters exercise their options.)

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Ping priced more conservatively, compared to its initial range, than some recent IPOs (looking at you, Cloudflare), likely due to its slower growth rate.

Ping isn’t like most of the tech companies we’ve seen go public recently. The company was previously a venture-backed startup with $128.3 million in total funding, according to Crunchbase. Its last venture round raised $35 million in 2014.

But the company, founded in 2002, was acquired by Vista Equity Partners in 2016 for $600 million. Rumors of an IPO have been floating around since last year. The new valuation of the company is quite the step up—it’s nearly twice what Vista Equity paid for Ping.

The company filed to go public last month with Goldman Sachs and Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch as underwriters.

Ping reported 25 percent ARR growth in 2019 and revenue of $201.6 million in 2018, up from $172.5 million in 2017. Its operating expenses also went up. The company reported operating expenses of $141 million in 2018, compared to $112.4 million in 2017.

Now that the price has been set, it’s all eyes on the Nasdaq tomorrow when Ping starts trading.

Illustration Credit: Li-Anne Dias