Education software company Instructure files for a US IPO, reporting $94M in revenue in quarter ended March 31; Thoma Bravo had taken it private in March 2020
Context & Ripple Effects
This filing closes a full ownership loop. Instructure went public in 2015 off a $40M Series E raised ahead of the offering and opened strong, closing its first day of trading up 12.5% at $18 per share. Four years later, Thoma Bravo agreed to take it private at $47.60 per share — roughly $2B — and completed the deal in March 2020.
The return to SEC registration comes just over a year into that ownership, with $94M in quarterly revenue reported for the quarter ended March 31. It also lands in an open market window: weeks later, PowerSchool — whose software reaches 70% of K-12 students in the US and Canada — raised $711M at a $3.5B valuation in its own IPO.
First-order effects
- Thoma Bravo moves from sole owner toward a partial exit, converting a $47.60-per-share take-private into a fresh public float while retaining control through the offering.
- Public investors regain direct access to one of the largest learning-management platforms, which they last held before the December 2019 buyout agreement.
Second-order effects
- PowerSchool's $711M raise validates the pricing window Instructure is filing into, and both listings pressure other PE-held education software assets to test public markets rather than wait for strategic buyers.
- A successful re-listing at a multiple above the ~$2B buyout price gives Thoma Bravo a repeatable playbook it can apply across its portfolio, tightening competition among buyout firms for education software targets.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds — public debut, PE take-private, rapid re-listing — education software becomes structured around a buy-build-float cycle rather than permanent private ownership, with public markets functioning as periodic liquidity events.
- The cluster of 2021 filings signals that pandemic-driven adoption of school software has been converted into durable public-market valuations, resetting what acquirers must pay for K-12 and higher-ed platforms.
The trend: Private equity firms are cycling education software companies from take-privates back into public markets, timing re-listings to post-pandemic demand for school technology.