Sonos Public Listing Comes As Investor Appetite for Tech IPOs Grows
Smart speaker maker Sonos has officially filed to go public.
The company, which confidentially filed for an IPO in April, could raise as much as $100 million in the offering and could be valued at as much as $3 billion.
According to its regulatory filings, Sonos brought in revenue of over $1 billion in the 12 months ending in March. It posted a profit of $13.1 million in the first half of its fiscal year, slightly lower than the $15 million brought in the previous year. Over the last 12 months though, the company posted a loss of about $16 million.
Sonos, founded in 2002, pioneered the wireless speaker space, creating a product that allowed people to have multiple speakers playing different audio at the same time. Its original competitors were the likes of Bose and Bang & Olufsen.
After Apple, Google, and Amazon entered the field, the company scrambled to compete in the rapidly changing landscape by launching smart speakers powered by Amazon’s Alexa. The company’s products can also seamlessly integrate with external streaming systems and voice assistants, including Spotify and Apple Music.
Sonos is betting that its flexibility will be attractive to investors, said Wall Street Journal reporter Maureen Farrell.
“Part of the appeal, and this is obviously something that they really tout and will thoroughly be touting on the roadshow, is that they can partner with all of these companies,” said Farrell, who broke the story that the company was looking to go public in April.
“They obviously have huge competition, but I think what they’re betting on is that you get one of them in your house, or a couple, you really like it, and then they have this moat around them.”
Sonos would join more than a dozen tech companies that made a public debut this year in an attempt to capitalize on growing investor appetite for tech stocks, said Farrell.
“Last year we saw some pretty disastrous IPOs,” she said, alluding to Snap’s turbulent public offering. “It’s been such an incredibly different landscape this year."
"Tech IPOs are up more than 50 percent year-to-date," said Farrell.
"It just seems like investors right now are clamoring for anything tech-ish.”
Sonos plans to list on the Nasdaq under the ticker "SONO."
For the full segment, [click here.](https://cheddar.com/videos/sonos-likely-to-raise-more-than-100-million-in-ipo)
Stocks closed at session lows Wednesday as investors grew skittish over the first reported case of the COVID-19 omicron variant in California. Josh Sailar, Partner at Blue Zone Wealth Advisors, joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss investor worry over the new variant, the Fed dropping the word 'transitory' to describe inflation and potentially speeding up their asset tapering timeline, 2022 predictions, and more.
The Robin Hood Foundation is New York City's largest poverty-fighting organization. For more than 30 years, Robin Hood has built and fueled non-profits across all five boroughs. CEO Richard Buery joined Cheddar News' Closing Bell ahead of his ringing the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange and later, lighting of the NYSE Christmas tree.
Creator commerce platform LTK raised $300 million in a recent funding round, now valuing the company at $2 billion. LTK is the world's largest influencer marketing platform and is known for helping to pioneer the so-called 'creator economy.' The company helps content creators make money off of their social media posts by hosting them on one central marketplace. LTK says more than $3 million in products are bought each year on its website and app. Now, the company is looking to continue its growth. LTK co-founder and president Amber Venz Box joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
Microsoft recently announced the standalone Teams Essentials as businesses continue to update their practices for the new norm of hybrid work life. Jared Spataro, corporate VP at Microsoft Modern Work, joined Cheddar to talk about solutions the tech giant has rolled out in order to help underserved small and medium-sized companies continue operations seamlessly. "We're excited about the opportunity to serve their needs better, and that, in particular, is focused on their meeting and communication needs," he said. "We start with Teams, which has been a wildly successful product for us up in the enterprise space, and now we have created a form of Teams that is particularly suited for small businesses."
No matter what you're in the market for this holiday season, there is one way that you can put some cash back in your pocket and stretch your gift budget a little bit further this year. With Lolli, for every gift you buy for someone else, you get the gift of free bitcoin back. CEO of Lolli, Alex Adelman, joins Cheddar News.
Iwao Fusillo, Chief Data & Analytics Officer, GM, joins Cheddar News to dispel myths and cut straight to the facts about GM's role in an all-electric future.
Over the Thanksgiving holiday, Elon Musk warned SpaceX employees in a leaked email that the company could be forced to file Chapter 11 bankruptcy if its raptor engine program fails. Musk then commented on the previous statement adding the detail that a recession could make such a bankruptcy possible.
Goldman Sachs is rolling out an Amazon Web Service for trading firms called GS Financial Cloud for Data with Amazon Web Services. The move comes as Wall Street looks to keep up with today's evolving tech.
Online ad-tech company Innovid made its public debut on the New York Stock Exchange. CEO and co-founders Zvika Netter joined Cheddar's "Opening Bell" to discuss factors that drove the company to launch an IPO via a SPAC deal. He noted that the rapid growth of connected TV advertising (CTV) made it an opportune time for his business to go public. While the company is profitable, Netter also explained the various avenues it will take to increase total revenue.
