By Manya Saini and Ateev Bhandari
(Reuters) -Design software program agency Figma mentioned on Wednesday it had raised $1.22 billion in its U.S. preliminary public providing, as traders heat up once more to pure-play tech listings following a years-long dry spell.
The San Francisco-based firm and a few of its present traders offered 36.9 million shares at $33 every, above the focused vary of $30 to $32 apiece. The vary was raised earlier this week, signaling sturdy demand.
Investor urge for food for high-growth know-how companies is returning after a chronic freeze in U.S. capital markets, encouraging extra corporations to pursue itemizing.
Figma goes public after a proposed $20 billion acquisition by Adobe was known as off in December 2023 over antitrust considerations.
A number of venture-backed startups — significantly in software program and synthetic intelligence — at the moment are testing public market demand, betting that improved valuations and easing rates of interest will help a stronger second half for IPOs.
The deal is seen as a litmus check for investor confidence and will pave the best way for different venture-backed tech startups ready to go public.
“The success of IPOs like CoreWeave and Circle suggests a beautiful setting for tech-listings and maybe a reopening of the marketplace for these issuers, lots of which have been sitting on the sidelines for the reason that begin of 2022,” mentioned Sam Kerr, head of fairness capital markets at Mergermarket.
The IPO values Figma at almost $19.34 billion on a completely diluted foundation — a major step up from the $12.5 billion it notched final yr in a young supply that allowed staff and early traders to money out a few of their stake.
IPO FUEL
The corporate builds real-time collaborative design instruments for digital merchandise and is investing closely in integrating AI throughout its platform.
Figma’s “public outperformance will doubtless gas the IPO urge for food for equally disrupting tech unicorns like Stripe and Databricks for the remainder of the yr,” mentioned Derek Hernandez, senior analyst, rising know-how at PitchBook.
The corporate, backed by Silicon Valley heavyweights reminiscent of Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia, structured its IPO as an public sale, asking traders to specify the variety of shares and the worth they have been prepared to pay.
Figma’s inventory will start buying and selling on the New York Inventory Alternate on Thursday underneath the ticker image “FIG.”
Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Allen & Firm and J.P. Morgan are the lead underwriters of the IPO.
(Reporting by Ateev Bhandari and Manya Saini in Bengaluru; Enhancing by Tasim Zahid)
