OPI UiPath on the New York Stock Exchange.
Source: NYSE
UiPath rose 17% on Wednesday on the company’s stock market exit, after the software vendor and its investors earned $ 1.34 million on the company’s IPO. The shares opened at $ 65.50.
The company, whose software helps companies automate repetitive tasks, sold shares Tuesday night at $ 56 per piece, above its projected price of $ 52 to $ 54. At the opening price, UiPath had a market value of $ 34 billion.
If subscribers buy their allotted shares, UiPath’s bid will be the third-largest for a U.S. software company, behind cloud database provider Snowflake, which raised $ 3.9 billion in September and Qualtrics, which generated $ 1.7 billion in January after leaving SAP. UiPath is entering the market at a time of rapid growth, as companies, from healthcare to energy producers, are looking for ways to automate operations in their financial, human resources and legal departments.
Revenue increased 81% last year to $ 607.6 million and the company’s loss fell to 92.4 million, from $ 519.9 million in 2019. UiPath’s gross margin, of 89%, is among the highest in software.
While UiPath joins a long list of high-growth cloud software companies to make itself public in the past three years, its debut comes amid a shift in investor sentiment. After more than double its value last year, the WisdomTree Cloud Computing Fund, made up of 58 listed cloud software vendors, has fallen 6.7% this year, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average has risen a 11%, at the close of Tuesday.
One of the strengths of UiPath is its ability to retain customers and encourage them to increase spending over time. In its last fiscal year, UiPath recorded a net revenue withholding of 145%, meaning the existing average customer increased spending by 45% over the previous year.
UiPath, which ranked No. 50 on CNBC’s 2020 Disruptor 50 list. Was founded in 2005 in Romania by Daniel Dines, a former Microsoft engineer. Dines moved UiPath to the U.S. about a decade later and established a headquarters in New York. About a quarter of its 2,863 full-time employees are headquartered in Bucharest, Romania.
The shares are listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “PATH”. Dines controls 88% of the voting shares and is the largest stakeholder, with more than 110 million shares valued at $ 6.2 billion, based on the listing price and includes some shares sold at the offer.
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