Sources: Altimeter Capital invested $150M-$200M in Cockroach Labs at a $2B valuation and $150M-$200M in workflow automation company Workato at a $1.7B valuation
Eric Newcomer / Newcomer : Tweets: @ericnewcomer Tweets: Eric Newcomer / @ericnewcomer : @modestproposal1 well put. touched on that theme in my latest newsletter. private markets are working to catch up. 100x ARR and 70x in two recent Altimeter investments. https://www.newcomer.co/...
Context & Ripple Effects
Altimeter Capital is writing some of its largest private checks into enterprise software: $150M-$200M apiece into database maker Cockroach Labs at a $2B valuation and into automation platform Workato at $1.7B. For Workato, it marks a step-change from the 2019 Series C led by Redpoint, with the company moving up a round class in barely a year.
The reported multiples are the story — Newcomer's own framing pegs the deals near 100x ARR and 70x ARR, echoing how Altimeter priced its public-side bet where its Snowflake-adjacent crossover playbook had already produced a stake worth roughly $4.4B at IPO price. Both private positions were subsequently confirmed as formal rounds: Cockroach's January Series E and Workato's Series D.
First-order effects
- Cockroach Labs and Workato each bank roughly $150M-$200M of growth capital without going public, letting them extend runway while staying private at nine-figure valuations.
- Altimeter concentrates its private portfolio in two enterprise infrastructure names at prices that leave little margin for error if revenue growth slows.
Second-order effects
- Rival crossover capital piles in behind the pricing: Tiger Global and Alkeon lead Moveworks' $200M round at a $2.1B valuation months later, showing automation is now contested territory for the same checks.
- Both bets reprice fast — Workato raises a Series E at a $5.7B valuation, more than triple the price Altimeter paid, and Cockroach Labs reaches a $5B valuation on a $278M Series F by year-end, validating the entry but also signaling how quickly late-stage software marks inflate.
Third-order effects
- If private markets keep 'catching up' to public multiples — the explicit theme in Newcomer's reporting — strong enterprise software companies can fund entire growth phases from crossover funds and defer or skip IPOs entirely, shifting pricing power from public buyers to a handful of late-stage funds.
- Valuation velocity of this kind (2x-plus within twelve months for both names) builds the conditions for a repricing cycle whenever public software multiples contract, with the newest entrants holding the most exposure.
The trend: Public-market crossover funds like Altimeter are setting private-market software prices at IPO-style multiples, keeping top enterprise companies private longer and compressing the window between late-stage rounds.