The web-based file hosting service Dropbox is planning to become a public company this spring.
Last valued at $10 billion, Dropbox may be one of the biggest companies to list themselves of late. Such a big IPO filing has only been rivaled by the global payment company First Data
Founded in 2002 by former Massachusetts Institute of Technology students Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi, Dropbox developed out of a desire to navigate the internet's then-slow nature and difficulties with large files. The service provided users with the unique ability to access files on the web, an ability that largely helped Ferdowsi as a MIT student who often forgot his USB drive for class.
Since then, the company had 500 million users as of 2016, including approximately 200,000 businesses. The company is currently carving its own path towards successful cloud storage capability, reportedly spending millions on data centers to rival that of Amazon
Like any company applying for IPO, the risks are not invisible. Last year witnessed the failures of new public companies such as the social media mobile app Snapchat
- https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-11/dropbox-is-said-to-file-confidentially-for-initial-offering
- http://fortune.com/2015/10/21/first-data-ipo/
- https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurengensler/2018/01/12/ipo-class-of-2018-dropbox-spotify-lyft/#49aec1135cc9
- https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/business/dealbook/dropbox-initial-public-offering.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fbusiness&action=click&contentCollection=business®ion=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront&mtrref=write.2020.ws
- https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/12/07/here-are-the-worst-ipos-of-2017.aspx