Reddit Inc, known for its message boards that became the go-to destination for day traders during this year’s meme stock frenzy, on Wednesday said it had confidentially filed for an initial public offering (IPO) with US securities regulators.
Founded in 2005 by Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian, Reddit was valued at US$10 billion in a private fundraising earlier this year.
Reuters in September reported that the company was hoping for a more than US$15 billion valuation by the time an IPO takes place.
Photo: Reuters
The filing comes as US IPOs hit record highs, fueled by ample liquidity due to accommodative monetary policies. Robinhood Markets Inc, Coupang Inc and Coinbase Global Inc are some of the companies that this year launched IPOs in the US.
As of October last year, Reddit had about 52 million daily active users and more 100,000 communities, or “sub-reddits.”
The company posted explosive growth as a result of retail investors flocking to its message boards at the start of the year for tips on trading shares of GameStop Corp and other so-called meme stocks.
San Francisco-based Reddit reported US$100 million in advertising revenue in the second quarter, an almost threefold jump from the same period last year.
In March, the company hired Drew Vollero — who as the first finance chief of Snap Inc guided its transition to a public company — as its first chief financial officer.
The company’s biggest investors include Fidelity Investments Inc, Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital and Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊).
Reddit did not disclose the number of shares that would be offered or the price range of the IPO in the draft registration statement with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained