Cloud-based storage company Box is said to have filed an IPO, according to an initial report from Quartz, later followed up by confirmations from The Wall Street Journal and Forbes. It did so quietly, filing the paperwork recently (possibly at the beginning of this week), according to the reports, and also silently, something it shares in common with Twitter, and which is made possible under a provision of the JOBS act for companies that drive less than $1 billion in yearly revenue.
Box, which is often compared to similar service Dropbox (which raised $250 million at a $10 billion valuation recently), only just closed funding of $100 million in December, at a valuation of $2 billion. The timing of that funding round seems unusual, given the intent to IPO, but Forbes says that round was actually about lining up international investors and getting a new, stronger business portfolio to show off to Wall Street during the process of going public.
Unlike its competitor Dropbox, Box has a strong focus on enterprise storage and file sharing. This should help it produce more consistent quarterly results that a Forbes source tells that publication will reassure and please investors.
Originally, Forbes had reported that the IPO could take as long as until summer to become public and get underway, but a second source says the company is actually looking to go public as soon as April, if all goes well. A Box spokesperson had only the following to offer:
We don’t have anything to share at this time. We’re focused on continuing to build our business and expand our customer relationships globally.
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