Shares of ON24, a maker of webinar and virtual event software, jumped nearly 54% in its debut Wednesday after raising $428M+ in its IPO
Context & Ripple Effects
ON24's debut extends a run of event-and-video software listings that began when Zoom closed up 72% on its first day in April 2019, a pop that established public-market appetite for remote-communication platforms well before the pandemic made webinars core enterprise infrastructure. ON24 raising $428M+ and jumping nearly 54% lands squarely in that template.
The timing matters: ON24 went public at the peak of virtual-event demand, and its reception directly set the stage for Kaltura's own debut five months later, where the same category — video platforms for virtual events and meetings — drew a smaller but still positive 20% first-day gain at a $1.24B valuation.
First-order effects
- ON24 converts pandemic-era webinar demand into a $428M+ war chest while handing early investors an immediate near-54% paper gain on day one.
Second-order effects
- The strong print de-risks the category for followers: Kaltura priced its own IPO in the same virtual-events space just months afterward, and later software debuts such as OneStream's 34% Nasdaq pop show the first-day-surge playbook kept working for enterprise software issuers.
Third-order effects
- Across this coverage — Eventbrite up 59% in 2018, Zoom up 72% in 2019, ON24 up 54% in 2021 — software IPOs consistently leave large first-day gains on the table, pointing to systematic underpricing as a durable feature of how these offerings are structured rather than a one-off.
The trend: Virtual-event and video software companies are listing in rapid succession, with outsized first-day pops signaling that public markets treat remote-engagement infrastructure as a lasting budget line rather than a pandemic artifact.