Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines.
This week we had the full crew on deck: Katie Roof, Matthew Lynley and myself — Alex Wilhelm. All that and we were joined by Jeff Grabow, the U.S. venture capital leader at EY.
Grabow was a treat to have on, as he has a wealth of knowledge of how companies go public. That may, or may not be a favorite topic of ours.
Staying in that lane, this week was IPO-heavy. First up we took on the HelloFresh IPO. The German company is following in the footsteps of Blue Apron, an ocean away. We were curious: Why go public now, when Blue Apron has had such a rough go of it? But, looking at the numbers, there are some encouraging signs that could help this market comp not spark a discount at the IPO window.
Next up we dove into two other IPOs: Switch’s large, slightly boring, but positive debut, and the CarGurus offering. Not every IPO is a Snap, and sometimes you need to knuckle down and get into the numbers on the less-well-known shops.
Finally, we tucked into the impending, possible, could-be-done, but-who-really-knows Magic Leap Series D which, according to a new filing, could tip the scales at $1 billion. The company has no public product, something that has caused doubters to clamor; at the same time, the company has public defenders who claim its AR technology could, in fact, be revolutionary.
Whoever is more correct time will determine. But at a minimum, if the firm can’t pull off its vision with another billion, it never had a chance.
All that and no Uber. You are welcome.
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