Venture-backed exits: the top 10 of 2014

Steven Loeb · December 29, 2014 · Short URL: https://vator.tv/n/3b16

Most were IPOs, but the biggest of all was Facebook's $22 billion acquisition of WhatsApp

Looking back on it, 2014 was a hell of a year for venture capital exits.

It  was a year where we saw some pretty incredible deals go down, some, like Renaissance Learning, and Ebates, being acquired for deals in the billions of dollars, as well as a huge number of IPOS for major companies, including KingTubeMogulCare.com, Coupons.com, and TrueCar.

Through the first nine months of 2014 there were 88 IPOs, already surpassing the 81 IPOs in 2013, according to the National Venture Capital Association. It should be noted, though, that the  average IPO offer amount is down to $123.9 million from $136.6 million last year

There were 23 VC-backed IPOs, which raised a total of $2.6 billion, during the third quarter of this year, making it the sixth quarter in a row to see at least 20 IPOs.  

In all, there were 341 M&A deals through Q3, compared to 391 M&A deals in all of 2013, so that is a number that will no doubt be surpassed in the final quarter. The average M&A deal is also up to $190 million, compared to $178 million last year. 

Let's take a look at the top10 venture-backed exits that contributed to these numbers in 2014, according to data from CBInsights. 

1. Mobile messaging startup Whatsapp

Exit: bought by Facebook

Valuation: $22 billion

Investors: Sequoia Capital

The biggest acquisition of the year, and one that kicked the mobile messaging space into high gear, leading to other purchases and investments, including Alibaba's $215 million investment in Tango, Rakuten's $900 million purchase of Viber and  the purchase of Bubbly the social messaging service where people share text and voice updates, by Indian social networking company Altruist.

2. Peer-to-peer loan provider Lending Club

Exit: IPO

Valuation: $5.4 billion

Investors: Norwest Venture Partners, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Morgenthaler Ventures, Union Square Ventures

The San Francisco-based company raised nearly $400 million in venture funding. In the full year 2013, Lending Club brought in $85 million in revenue, up from $30 million in 2012. It raised $870 million in its IPO.

3. Bandwidth infrastructure services provider Zayo Group Holdings

Exit: IPO

Valuation: $4.4 billion

Investors:  Oak Investment Partners, Battery Ventures, Columbia Capital, Centennial Ventures

The company had raised $225 million in funding, and generated $278 million in revenue in the third quarter of this year. It raised $287.8 million in its IPO. 

4. High-definition personal camera manufacturer GoPro

Exit: IPO

Valuation: $3.1 billion

Investors: US Venture Partners, Walden International, Steamboat Ventures

The company had raised $288.2 million and saw $985 million in revenue for 2013. GoPro raised $427 million in its IPO.

5. Networking equipment maker Arista Networks

Exit: IPO

Valuation:  $2.7 billion

Investors: Khosla Ventures, Index Ventures

The company saw a profit of $42.5 million on sales of $361.2 million in 2013. Arista raised $226 million in its IPO.

6. Food delivery company Grubhub Seamless

Exit: IPO

Valuation: $2 billion

Investors: Lightspeed Venture Partners, Benchmark Capital, DAG Ventures

After its merger with Seamless in May of last year, the company generated revenue of $137.1 million in 2013, an increase of 67% from 2012. The company had 3.4 million Active Diners as of the end of last year. The company raised $84 million in venture capital, and $192 million in its IPO.

7. Virtual reality technology company Oculus VR

Exit: bought by Facebook

Valuation: $2 billion

Investors: Spark Capital, Founders Fund, Matrix Partners, Andreessen Horowitz, Formation 8

Facebook spent a total of $2 billion on Oculus back in March. That included $400 million in cash and 23.1 million shares of Facebook common stock, which are valued at $1.6 billion. In addition, the agreement also provided for an additional $300 million earn-out in cash and stock based on the achievement of certain milestones.

The company had raised $93.4 million in venture capital funding.

8.  Enterprise mobile management and security solutions provider AirWatch

Exit: bought by VMWare

Valuation: $1.5 billion

Investors: Insight Venture Partners, Accel Partners

Founded in 2003, AirWatch is a mobile security and enterprise mobility management provider, with solutions that include mobile device, email, application, content, laptop and browser management. The company delivers solutions for either Corporate Owned or Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) programs. It has raised $225 million in venture capital.

9. Gealth information provider Castlight Health

Exit: IPO

Valuation: $1.4 billion

Investors: Oak Investment Partners, US Venture Partners, Venrock, Maverick Capital

The company, which raised $177 million in venture capital, booked $13 million in sales in 2013. Castlight  raised $178 million in its IPO. 

10. OnDeck Capital, an online small-business lender

Exit: IPO 

Valuation: $1.3 billion

Investors: Google Ventures, Khosla Ventures, RRE Ventures, Foundation Capital, First Round Capital

The company,  which raised $409 million in venture capital, has a loss of $24.2 million on $107.6 million in revenue in the first nine months of 2014. It raised $200 million in its IPO.

(Image source: getbusymedia.com)

Support VatorNews by Donating

Read more from our "Trends and news" series

More episodes

Related Companies, Investors, and Entrepreneurs

TubeMogul, Inc.

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on

Founded in 2006 by online video buffs who met while in graduate school and won the UC Berkeley Business Plan Competition, TubeMogul's objective from the start has been to empower online video producers, advertisers and the online video industry by providing publishing tools and insightful, easy to interpret analytics.

With TubeMogul, users upload videos once and TubeMogul deploys them to as many of the top video sharing sites the producer chooses. TubeMogul's integrated analytics then provide a single source of metrics on where, when, and how often the videos are viewed. TubeMogul's free beta service has been live since November of 2006. In January 2008, TubeMogul announced the launch of its Premium Products, which include a host of new professional features.

Care.com

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on

Founded in 2006, Care.com is the largest and fastest growing service used by families to find high-quality caregivers, providing a trusted place to easily connect, share caregiving experiences and get advice. The company addresses the unique lifecycle of care needs that each family goes through-child care, special needs care, tutoring and lessons, senior care, pet care, housekeeping and more. The service helps families find and select the best care available based on detailed profiles, background checks and references for hundreds of thousands of mom-reviewed and pre-screened providers who seek to share their services. Through its Care.com Employer Program, corporations can offer Care.com memberships as a benefit to employees. www.care.com

Ebates

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on

Name of the company

TrueCar Inc

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on

TrueCar, Inc. is an online automotive information and communications platform focused on creating a better car buying experience for dealers and consumers.  Consumers want a hassle-free car buying experience and dealers want high-quality sales velocity.  TrueCar helps achieve these goals by providing unbiased market information on new car transactions and by supplying an online communications platform through which dealers and consumers can communicate with each other.  TrueCar’s market-based information provides both consumers and dealers with an accurate and comprehensive understanding of what others actually paid recently for similar vehicles, both locally and nationally.  TrueCar’s communications platform then allows informed, ready-to-buy consumers to communicate directly with participating dealers.  Some of the nation’s largest and most well respected membership and service organizations rely on websites powered by TrueCar to help educate their members and customers who are in the automotive market.  TrueCar is headquartered in Santa Monica, CA, and has offices in San Francisco, CA, and Austin, TX.  After experiencing dramatic growth since 2006, TrueCar is developing a suite of products and services centered on radical clarity through the comprehensive analysis of market data and information.  TrueCar’s participating dealer partners have sold over 500,000 new vehicles to TrueCar users nationwide.

 

Lending Club

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on

Lending Club is a social lending network where members can borrow and lend money among themselves at better rates.

Lending Club provides a much improved infrastructure for social lending: state-of-the-art technology to authenticate all users (ensuring making sure they are who they say they are); credit scoring systems which rate borrower risk; and, the automated clearing house (ACH) system to move the funds between both parties. In addition, we provide our LendingMatch™ system to minimize risk and allow community based lending.

 

OnDeck Capital

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on

We’re 100% focused on small business.

We launched OnDeck in 2007 to solve a major issue facing small businesses: financing. We combined our passion for Main Street with cutting-edge technology to evaluate businesses based on their actual performance, not personal credit.

That’s enabled us to say “yes” more often and faster than traditional lenders. And that lets owners spend their time where it should be—on growing their business, not seeking financing.