2018 IPO Prospects: WeWork on a Buying Spree

According to research from Emergent, the world’s co-working memberships are expected to more than double from 1.6 million in 2017 to 3.8 million by 2020. However, the demographics of co-working have changed with freelancers making up just 39% of co-workers in 2017, compared to 80% in 2010. Co-working market leader WeWork is a favorite to go public this year. >>>

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2018 IPO Prospects: AirBnB More than Halfway Ready to List

If there is one Billion Dollar Unicorn that has never been in a rush to go public, it is AirBnB. The ten-year old company has taken to heart Warren Buffett’s mantra of “get rich slow”. After carefully planning its financial and operating model, AirBnB believes that it will be ready to go public this year.

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Billion Dollar Unicorns: Improbable Joins the Club

According to a Research and Markets report, the global Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) games market was worth $26.9 billion in 2016 and is expected to reach $44.6 billion by 2022 at a CAGR of 8.9%. Based on the success of its platform SpatialOS that enables creation of simulations and virtual worlds for video games and simulations, Improbable joined the Billion Dollar Unicorn Club last year. >>>

Billion Dollar Unicorns: SoFi Delays IPO Plans

According to The 2017 Americas Alternative Finance Industry Report, the alternative finance market across the US, Canada, Latin America, and the Caribbean has grown 23% to $35.2 billion in 2016. A leading Billion Dollar Unicorn in this sector is Social Finance or SoFi. >>>

2018 IPO Prospects: Dropbox Has Made Good Progress

According to a Marketsand Markets report, the cloud storage market size is estimated to grow from $23.76 billion in 2016 to $74.94 billion by 2021, at a CAGR of 25.8%. Growth is driven by factors such as high demand for hybrid cloud storage, growing need for enterprise mobility, and the need for easy implementation of cloud storage solutions. Cloud-based storage services provider and Billion Dollar Unicorn Dropbox is one of the main IPO prospects for 2018. >>>

2018 IPO Prospects: Spotify to Test Direct Listing

According to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the US streaming music accounted for a majority of the retail music industry revenues. For the first half of 2017, retail revenues grew 17% to $4 billion, of which streaming services accounted for $2.5 billion and grew 48% over the year. Revenue from listeners paying to listen to streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music grew 61% over the year to $1.7 billion. Of this, $0.3 billion came from ad-supported on-demand options and $0.5 billion from listeners paying for radio services. About 30 million people in the country listen to a streaming music site.

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Oracle Ready to Battle Amazon AWS

Oracle (NYSE: ORCL) may have delivered a rather tepid quarterly outlook as part of its recent result announcement. But the market is very hopeful of its cloud strategy as the company continues to battle it out with Amazon and adds more companies to its arsenal. First, the financials.

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2018 IPO Prospects: Lyft Appears to be Changing Gears to List

According to a Goldman Sachs report, the global ride-hailing market is expected to grow from $36 billion in 2017 to $285 billion by 2030. The average number of ride-hailing trips a day globally are expected to grow from 15 million in 2017 to 97 million by 2030. The ride-hailing companies are expected to charge an average 23% commission on the gross sales, translating to net revenues of $65 billion by 2030 for the industry. While Uber continues to remain the market leader in the industry, its recent troubles have helped drive usage for competitors, such as Lyft, to higher levels. Lyft may even beat Uber to an IPO listing this year.

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Billion Dollar Unicorns: Competition Heats up for Slack

According to a MarketsandMarkets report, the enterprise collaboration market is expected to grow from $26.68 billion in 2016 to $49.51 billion by 2021 at a CAGR of 13.2% driven by widespread usage of social media and mobile devices. Billion Dollar Unicorn Slack is a leading player in the market that has recently raised funding from the Softbank Vision Fund. >>>

Billion Dollar Unicorns: CarGurus Bootstraps its Way to an IPO

It is hard to find a company these days that has stayed away from venture funding. Used car marketplace CarGurus is one such rarity. It recently went public on the NASDAQ under the ticker CARG. >>>