IPOs: first tech deal of the year. Cloud-based storage company Box (BOX) set to price tonight, seeking to sell 12.5 million shares at $11-$13
The good news: 1) hot space, 2) rapid growth (revenues up 80 percent in first nine months of 2014), large base of business customers (44,000).
The bad news: 1) lots of deep-pocket competition (Microsoft, Google, Amazon), 2) large losses with little prospect of turning green soon. According to the company's S1, "We have a history of cumulative losses and we do not expect to be profitable for the foreseeable future."
Still, the enterprise software IPOs have generally done well: Zendesk, Hubspot, New Relic, Hortonworks.
If Box is successful, you can expect to see Dropbox and others coming sooner rather than later.