At least 42% of start up founders in the US do not expect their companies to go public in the future — up 62% from last year, according to a recent survey. Another 34% said “maybe“, while only 24% said “definitely“. That means there are likely to be fewer initial public offerings, or IPOs, on the horizon.
Nasdaq Private Markets surveyed a group of startup founders, CEOs, and directors at the South by Southwest conference in Austin, US, last weekend. Nearly half of companies surveyed were 10 years old or older, while nearly a third were one to three years old. A quarter were in finance, while another 25% were in software or hardware tech. The remaining were split between healthcare, consumer goods, entertainment, and others sectors.
So if they don't want to go public, how do they expect to fund themselves? Just over a third, or 35%, of the respondents said that venture capital was their preferred path to funding, while about 31% said private equity .
But only 10% said that funding was their top priority for the upcoming year. Meanwhile, 26% said marketing and advertising was their biggest priority, while another 26% said hiring new talent.
There's been a chill in the tech start-up world, and no tech startup has gone public in 2016 in the US.
That means that tech bank ers have to get creative in how they work with clients. Goldman Sachs' global head of tech, media, and telecom banking, Dan Dees, last year said his firm is developing new teams to work with tech companies at multiple stages in their development, especially early on.
That can mean helping companies go global or brand as private players -and it means helping them raise capital in private funding rounds, not just in initial public offerings. BUSINESS INSIDER