Slack soars to $21 billion valuation in debut after shunning IPO

SAN FRANCISCO: A parade of initial public offerings from Silicon Valley this year have garnered mixed receptions from investors. Slack Technologies Inc took a different route on Thursday, and saw its shares soar as it went public without an IPO. Slack opened at $38.50 on the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday, well above the reference price of $26 that was set for the shares. The stock climbed as high as $42 apiece, giving the company a market value of more than $21 billion. The fully diluted valuation is even higher.

That’s a huge increase from Slack’s last private funding round in August, which valued the company at $7.1 billion. Thursday’s debut makes Slack one of the most valuable technology companies to reach US markets this year, following in the footsteps of Uber Technologies Inc and Lyft Inc.

Slack, which makes software for workers to chat and collaborate on projects, directly listed its shares on New York Stock Exchange, bypassing the usual fundraising process of an IPO and allowing shareholders to sell right away without a lockup period.


A parallel for this unusual type of stock listing is Spotify Technology SA. The musicstreaming provider went public using a similar manoeuvre last year, the last high-profile company to do so. Spotify’s stock is up 14% since then.