Start-Ups May Wait Longer to Go Public: VCs
Start-up companies may be more reluctant to go public after the volatility that has hit stocks like Groupon, Zyngaand Facebookfollowing their initial public offerings, according to two venture capitalists and Groupon co-founders.
Brad Keywell and Eric Lefkosky, the co-founders of venture capital firm Lightbank, said that more companies may choose to wait to go public.
Speaking from Chicago Ideas Week, Lefkosky told CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street,” that “more and more companies will wait longer and longer because the public markets have been unforgiving for companies that are very young.”
While Lefkosky said he was unable to provide an explanation for why companies like Groupon , Zynga and Facebook have had such poor starts as publicly traded companies, he said as venture capitalists, “Our role is to build great companies that over the long term will do well.”
Keywell echoed this view. “We focus on growing businesses, finding great entrepreneurs, building great teams and finding roles for these businesses so they’re adding real value for the customers and they grow because of the value they’re creating,” he said.
(Read More:10 Ideas That Made $100 Million.)
The Groupon co-founders also have no regrets that they did not sell the company to a Google or other large internet company when they had a chance.
