To be fair, most companies going public lately have been unprofitable. Yes, not true historically; but the desire for savings yield/strategy funds that will buy no matter what/success of flipping ipos has lowered the bar. And the P/S metrics .. well, Box would be stupid _not_ to ipo right now. I expect they'll play the same trick as others and sell a small percentage of the fully diluted share count to create a sellers market for the shares, and target a 50-100 multiple on revenue. When the market gets used to their price they can file a secondary.
edit: I should clarify again based on sibling/nephew comments... I think it's too far off topic to go into this in depth, but clearly running at a loss is expected and appropriate for companies at a certain stage of their growth profile. Even big companies (like Amazon, like someone noted) can do this if they prefer to invest in pursuing large enough growth opportunities out of cash flow vs selling debt or shares. Regardless, the revenue growth has to show up at some point, and spending in sales has to show ROI.
of course, i'm 100% with you. if i were box i'd be wanting to ipo on a hot market to avoid dilution/raise as much cash as possible. this is a good move for box. all i'm saying is that this isn't (imho) a good investment for ipo investors.
edit: I should clarify again based on sibling/nephew comments... I think it's too far off topic to go into this in depth, but clearly running at a loss is expected and appropriate for companies at a certain stage of their growth profile. Even big companies (like Amazon, like someone noted) can do this if they prefer to invest in pursuing large enough growth opportunities out of cash flow vs selling debt or shares. Regardless, the revenue growth has to show up at some point, and spending in sales has to show ROI.