SaaS Security Platform Crowdstrike Files For IPO

SaaS Security platform Crowdstrike has filed to go public, aiming to raise $100 million in its initial public offering (IPO).

Crowdstrike’s cloud-based technology aims to detect breaches before they occur by tracking activity on desktops, server computers and other devices. The company’s prospectus revealed that in the year that ended on Jan. 31, Crowdstrike had a net loss of $140 million, and revenue more than doubled to $249.8 million. Most of the company’s sales are generated via subscriptions sold to over 2,500 companies, with clients including Credit Suisse, Australian mobile phone company Telstra, Tribune Media, and Amazon Web Services.

“Organizations everywhere are becoming more distributed as they adopt the cloud, increase workforce mobility, and grow their number of connected devices,” the company said in its prospectus, according to CNBC.

The paperwork also showed that Crowdstrike’s sales and marketing costs rose 66 percent last year to $172.7 million, with most of the costs due to employee-related expenses.

Founded in 2011, California-based SaaS Crowdstrike was valued at $3 billion last June. The filing shows that an unnamed channel partner was responsible for 15 percent of the company’s revenue in the year that ended Jan. 31.

“We recently announced a strategic technology and go-to-market partnership with Dell Inc. that will enable Dell’s business customers to seamlessly add the Falcon platform to their purchase of Dell hardware, ” Crowdstrike said in the filing. “Dell and SecureWorks Corp. also agreed to take our Falcon platform to market as their preferred endpoint security offering through their global sales organizations.”

Warburg Pincus is Crowdstrike’s biggest shareholder, with a 30 percent stake. Accel has 20 percent and Alphabet’s CapitalG investment arm comes in at 11 percent.

The stock will trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol “CRWD.” And while the filing stated that Crowdstrike is looking to raise as much as $100 million in the IPO, that is considered a placeholder at this time.