Squarespace says it filed confidentially for an IPO in the US; the company was valued at $1.7B in December 2017
Context & Ripple Effects
Squarespace's confidential filing closes a long private run: the company was valued at just $1.7B in December 2017, and by January 2021 it was readying a public debut. Two months later it banked a $300M round at a $10B valuation, then chose a direct listing on NYSE instead of a traditional IPO, disclosing 2020 revenues of $621.1M (up 28%) and net income of $30.6M.
The filing also fits a cohort: BigCommerce, which builds online-storefront software, had confidentially filed for an IPO six months earlier, putting two e-commerce site builders on parallel paths to market.
First-order effects
- Squarespace gains access to public capital while staying profitable — the direct-listing route lets existing holders sell without issuing new shares or paying underwriter discounts.
- BigCommerce's earlier confidential filing confirms Squarespace is not alone: the storefront-software category is entering public markets as a group.
Second-order effects
- Late-stage investors who paid into the March $10B round face a public-market reality check — when trading began, the stock closed down ~9% at $43.65, valuing Squarespace near $5.9B, well under that private mark.
- Rival website builders must now benchmark against a publicly disclosed P&L, forcing comparable disclosure of revenue growth and margins across the category.
Third-order effects
- The gap between the $10B private round and the ~$6.8B reference-price valuation echoes Square's 2015 IPO, which priced below its last private round — a recurring sign that late-stage private marks outrun what public buyers will pay.
- If profitable SaaS companies keep choosing direct listings over underwritten IPOs, the traditional bookbuild loses its default status for companies that don't need to raise primary capital.
The trend: E-commerce enablement software firms are racing to public markets through confidential filings and direct listings, with private valuations repeatedly overshooting what public investors will pay.