DigitalOcean Stock Closes Below IPO Price On First Day Of Trading

Cloud computing startup DigitalOcean made its public market debut on Wednesday, closing at $42.50, or nearly 10 percent below its IPO price. 

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The company set an IPO price of $47 on Wednesday, the high end of its $44 to $47 pricing rage, and raised more than $775 million through its public offering. Its stock opened at $41.50, about 12 percent below its IPO price. DigitalOcean is trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker DOCN.

DigitalOcean is backed by investors including Andreessen Horowitz and Access Industries. Among the largest shareholders in the company are Andreessen Horowitz, IA Ventures, and AI Droplet Holdings LLC, which is managed by Access Industries Management.

AI Droplet’s stake in the company comes out to $1.1 billion at the IPO price of $47, while Andreessen Horowitz’s stake comes out to $736 million, and IA Ventures’ is around $696 million. Access Industries led DigitalOcean’s last funding round, a $50 million Series C in May 2020.

DigitalOcean’s stock falling below its IPO price upon opening is somewhat of a rarity these days for tech stocks. The public markets have been enthusiastic about tech companies, with many seeing their stocks surge on their first day of trading.

The company is among several that have recently filed to go public, along with real estate tech platform Compass, TV maker Vizio, and online clothing resale marketplace ThredUp. 

Offering tools for developers, startups, and businesses, New York-based DigitalOcean reported revenue of nearly $318.4 million in 2020, an increase by about 25 percent from the year prior. At the same time, its losses didn’t go up by much, going from $40.4 million in 2019 to about $43.6 million in 2020, according to the company’s S-1.

Illustration: Li-Anne Dias