UPDATED 00:39 EDT / OCTOBER 07 2016

NEWS

Report: Snap (formerly Snapchat) preparing for an IPO in 2017

In yet another sign of a warming market for stock offerings by technology companies, Snap Inc. is working towards going public in the new year, according to a report published Thursday.

The Wall Street Journal claims that the initial public offering of Snap, previously known as Snapchat, could value the company at $25 billion or more, making it one of the highest-profile IPOs in years. Sources told the paper that the company is aiming to sell the shares around March 2017.

As of Snap’s last round in May, it was valued at $18 billion, making the $25 million figure a more than decent premium. The company is said not to have filed an S-1 form with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission yet, the first part of the IPO process, but could do so confidentially because it will have less than $1 billion in revenues this year. According to Bloombergthe company has not formally hired banks to underwrite the IPO as of yet, another indication that it may be some time off.

Despite previously measly financials, which included revenues of $59 million in 2015, up from $3 million in 2014, Snap is said to have told investors it expects revenue of between $250 million and $350 million this year and up to $1 billion in 2017.

Snap makes its money primarily through running ads, which it first introduced in 2014. Recently, along with its name change, Snap announced its Spectacles product, a $130 pair of glasses which includes integrated video that is said to be capable of taking a day’s worth of Snaps on a single charge. How many of Snap’s 150 million active users, the vast majority of whom are millennials, will embrace the glasses, is yet to be seen.

Confidence

While it’s easy to make fun of Snap, as a 40-something member of Generation X who simply does not and probably never will get the appeal of the service, credit is due given that the service has become extremely popular among the younger generation. More people aged 12 to 24 now use Snapchat than Facebook, according to one report.

That Snapchat is even considering an IPO signals a growing confidence when it comes to the support of public markets for tech floats, with the most recent IPO, Software-as-a-Service provider Coupa Software Inc. surging on its debut Thursday.

Coming into a potential IPO, Snapchat has raised $2.63 billion to date from investors including Tencent Holdings, SV Angel, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Benchmark, General Catalyst Partners and Institutional Venture Partners.

Image credit: 143601516@N03/Flickr/CC by 2.0

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