News is just crossing the wire about Dropbox confidentially filing for its IPO, the same company that Steve Jobs once called “a feature, not a product.”
After increasing expectations for the company to go public last year, Bloomberg reports today that Dropbox has quietly filed for an IPO.
Those close to the matter say the file-sharing service is working with J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs for the listing. Dropbox is estimated to be worth $10 billion.
Dropbox is talking to other banks this month to fill additional roles on the IPO, the people said. The company is aiming to list in the first half of this year, one of the people said.
Bloomberg notes that Dropbox has annual revenue of over $1 billion and has a track record of being profitable. This will mark one of the biggest U.S. tech IPOs in recent history. Sweden-based Spotify also just announced going public, but the music streaming service has a more complicated financial situation.
Famously, Steve Jobs once called Dropbox “a feature, not a product.” Here’s how the file-sharing founder, Drew Houston remembers his interaction with Jobs via Business Insider:
And so he started trolling us a little bit, saying we’re a feature, not a product, and telling us a bunch of things like that we don’t control an operating system so we’re going to be disadvantaged, we’re going to have to figure out distribution deals, which are risky, and sort of a bunch of business-plan critiques. But then he was like, ‘Alright, well I guess we’re gonna have to go kill you, basically.’ Maybe not in those words, but pretty close.
Maybe Jobs was a bit jealous of what Dropbox had going on? In any case, some believe Dropbox could quickly trade above the $10B valuation after its IPO.
While it’s uncertain whether the company will be able to initially sell shares above that valuation, the stock could trade higher once it’s public, the people said.
In recent months, the company has continually been updating its collaboration software Dropbox Paper and also rolled out new professional plans.
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