Dropbox, a US-based online storage technology provider backed by enterprise software producer Salesforce, is looking to hire underwriters for an initial public offering, Reuters reported yesterday.
The company intends to begin interviewing investment banks in the next few weeks, people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Friday. The IPO would be the largest for a technology company since social media company Snap floated in a $3.9bn offering in March this year.
Founded in 2007, Dropbox has built a cloud-based freemium service that enables users to store a substantial amount of data online, where it can be accessed quickly from a range of devices.
The platform had 500 million registered users as of 2016, and some 200,000 companies have signed up to its business service, which Dropbox reportedly views as its primary growth area. Founder and CEO Drew Houston has said it expects to generate more than $1bn in revenue in 2017.
Salesforce’s corporate venturing unit, Salesforce Ventures, has revealed Dropbox is one of its portfolio companies but has not disclosed when it invested. Dropbox has raised a total of $607m in equity funding since it emerged from accelerator Y Combinator.
The company’s last equity round was a $350m series C backed by investors including BlackRock, T. Rowe Price and Morgan Stanley in early 2014 at a reported $10bn valuation.
Index Ventures had led a $250m series B round in 2011 that valued Dropbox at $4bn and which included Benchmark Capital, Goldman Sachs, Greylock Partners, IVP, RIT Capital Partners, Valiant Capital Partners, Sequoia Capital, Accel and private investors Hadi and Ali Partovi
Investment banking firm JP Morgan reportedly led a $500m credit line for the company in spring 2014, and joined Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Macquarie and Royal Bank of Canada to provide it with a $600m credit line in March this year.