LinkedIn Jan. 27 confirmed it has filed for an initial public offering with the Securities and
Exchange Commission, with designs on raising at least $175 million in stock.
LinkedIn, the latest Internet company to commit to the
publicly traded stock market, is the world's largest business contact Website
for professionals. The Website help 90 million users network with past and
present colleagues and has also become a valuable hiring tool for human
resource managers.
According to the documents filed with the SEC, LinkedIn's
revenue topped $161 million through Sept. 30., with net income of $1.85
million.
LinkedIn makes money from advertising, premium
subscriptions and software service professional recruiters use to hire new
employees.
LinkedIn's hiring solutions, which CEO Jeff Weiner said in November have really taken off for the company, appear to be its meal
ticket, comprising 41 percent of revenue in the first nine months of 2010.
The number of shares to be offered and the price range
for the offering have not been determined. However, a portion of the shares
will be issued and sold by LinkedIn, and a portion will be sold by certain
stockholders of LinkedIn.
LinkedIn investors include Greylock Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners, Goldman Sachs and Sequoia Capital.
Morgan Stanley, BofA Merrill Lynch
and J.P. Morgan Securities are managing the books for the IPO. Allen &
Company and UBS Securities will be acting as co-managers.
LinkedIn's IPO filing, coming one day after content aggregator
Demand Media enjoyed its first full day of public trading on the New York Stock
Exchange, could set in motion other IPOs.
Local deal Website Groupon, which
spurned a $6 billion merger offer from Google, is said to be mulling an IPO
after taking $950 million in funding from Accel Partners, Battery Ventures and
Digital Sky Technologies.
Facebook, which
garnered a $50 billion valuation after taking $1.5 billion funding from Goldman
Sachs and Digital Sky.
Many analysts expect Facebook to file an IPO by
April 30, 2012, when it will have to disclose its finances under SEC rule.
Other Internet companies that could be tempted to follow in
LinkedIn's footsteps include the successful microblog service Twitter,
which is expected to make $150 million from advertising this year, and online game power Zynga, which makes a living from offering social games on Facebook.
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