First Utah Company to Go Public This Year Soars in IPO
*By Michael Teich*
Pluralsight, a platform for online learning courses, was off to an auspicious start as a publicly traded company Thursday when the stock opened 33 percent above its IPO price on the Nasdaq.
Shares of the Utah-based tech company, which are trading under ticker symbol “PS”, opened for trading at $20 a share compared with the IPO price of $15. Pluralsight's CEO, Aaron Skonnard, told Cheddar that Wall Street was optimistic because investors realize that his company's cloud-based platform is well positioned to close a “massive skills gap” created by rapidly changing technology.
Pluralsight is the first company from Utah to go public in 2018. Skonnard said there are advantages to creating a technology company in Utah instead of Silicon Valley, including a thriving tech community in “Silicon Slopes” that attracts talent away from the San Francisco Bay area. The lower cost of living in Utah is also a “big home run” for employees.
The future of education is going to look a lot different in the years ahead, said Skonnard. Four-year college degrees are a lot less relevant than they were 20 years ago, and emerging technologies will cause the trend to continue. Pluralsight's focus on technology-based skills such as HTML and JavaScript put it in a position to provide courses that cater to the evolving demands by its corporate clients, which include AT&T and Adobe.
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/utah-s-tech-unicorn-pluralsight-has-strong-nasdaq-debut).
VENU CEO JW Roth breaks ground on a 20,000-seat, state-of-the-art amphitheater in Texas—part of a $300M public-private expansion to redefine live music.
Despite healthcare spending cuts, medtech stocks like Edwards Life Sciences, Stryker, and Boston Scientific are rising, especially those serving older pati
The original Birkin bag created by Hermès for Jane Birkin in 1984 is up for auction in Paris. Sotheby’s expects the iconic bag to sell for hundreds of thousands of euros on Thursday.
Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company is taking down antisemitic comments and other “inappropriate posts” made by its Grok chatbot, including some praising Adolf Hitler.
Joby CPO Eric Allison discusses the UAE’s historic EVTOL take off, marking Dubai as the launchpad for global air taxi adoption and Joby’s commercial readiness.
CFRA’s Angelo Zino joins us to unpack Meta’s Superintelligence Labs and what it means for the future of AI, innovation, and the company’s bold new direction.
AIRO CEO Joe Burns and Executive Chairman Chirinjeev Kathuria talks the future of aerospace, drones, and urban air mobility through innovation and synergy.
