拖延一年終上市：BOX公司CEO及CFO談IPO之路
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????云存儲公司Box于1月23日正式上市，成功融資1.75億美金。這家擁有十年歷史的公司所經(jīng)歷的IPO之路可謂非常漫長，它于去年三月就申請了IPO，但由于擔(dān)心投資者會因公司的巨額虧損而對其股票敬而遠(yuǎn)之，最終還是推遲了上市日期。目前Box的表現(xiàn)可能會讓投資者們多少產(chǎn)生了一些心理安慰，截至今年1月31日，Box公司的全年營收翻了一番還多，而且它的股票價格已經(jīng)比14美元每股的IPO價格高出了近70%。 ????上市當(dāng)日，《財富》在紐交所采訪了Box公司的CEO阿隆?列維和CFO狄倫?史密斯。以下是本次采訪節(jié)選： ????《財富》：從你們首次申請上市至今，已經(jīng)過去了很長一段時間，為什么選在1月23日上市？ ????列維：我們選定的日期不是1月22日就是23日。 ????史密斯：我們一直用長遠(yuǎn)的眼光看待這件事，打算等到自己和市場都準(zhǔn)備好了的時候再上市。這個過程并不總是一帆風(fēng)順，但能夠到今天這個程度，我們還是很高興……我們的目標(biāo)是繼續(xù)執(zhí)行我們的商業(yè)模式，并讓市場了解，展示這個模式的杠桿作用。我們并沒有特地尋找什么明確的“時間表”。 ????你曾在Twitter上稱，如果公司股價漲得很高，你會‘把錢留在臺面上’?，F(xiàn)在這么多錢都留在了臺面上，你是否感到后悔？ ????列維：我沒法評價定價過程的變化，不過我們以前在Twitter上發(fā)的有些內(nèi)容肯定沒有意義了……我們的業(yè)務(wù)模式需要你理解企業(yè)IT領(lǐng)域的變革，非常高興吸引來了愿意致力于重塑企業(yè)平臺的強(qiáng)勢投資者。 ????在路演過程中，你有沒有聽到預(yù)期投資者反復(fù)提到某個預(yù)料之外的問題？ ????列維：有些人對我們的企業(yè)有誤解，部分原因是由于我們在首次申請上市后沉寂了八九個月的時間，有人認(rèn)為我們的公司是一家做存儲的公司，但我們不是。我們是一家軟件公司，80%的毛利來自軟件銷售。我認(rèn)為這就是別人一開始誤解我們的地方，他們不了解存儲只是我們基礎(chǔ)架構(gòu)中的一部分，而不是主打賣點(diǎn)。用戶可以獲得無限的存儲空間，然后付費(fèi)買我們的應(yīng)用。那些一直緊密關(guān)注我們公司的人已經(jīng)理解了這一點(diǎn)，但有些新接觸到我們的人并不理解。 ????你在去年七月《財富》舉辦的科技頭腦風(fēng)暴大會上曾提到，Box在選擇IPO的時機(jī)上犯了一個錯誤，前一年你們做了大量燒錢的投資，還沒有在營收上體現(xiàn)出成果?，F(xiàn)在你能否更好地解釋這一點(diǎn)，另外今后一兩年你們是否還會做出類似的投資支出？ ????列維：在2012年到2013年，我們的確做出了一批新的投資，用于國際擴(kuò)張和組建現(xiàn)場銷售團(tuán)隊等等。這些在銷售和營銷上的投資需要時間才能發(fā)展成熟。而現(xiàn)在這些投資帶來的效益已經(jīng)開始在本財務(wù)年度逐步顯現(xiàn)。隨著時間的推移，我們的銷售和市場開支還會繼續(xù)提高，但它們占公司營收的比例會隨著時間逐步下降。 ????現(xiàn)在有些員工的優(yōu)先認(rèn)股權(quán)已經(jīng)成了流動證券，你是否擔(dān)心有些員工會因此離開公司？ ????列維：Box有一種創(chuàng)業(yè)文化，當(dāng)然有些員工在創(chuàng)業(yè)早期階段的確很出色，也可能這樣做。但我們的團(tuán)隊也一直在增長，他們都是對Box的事業(yè)非常投入的人，我們把他們稱為“自己人”。對于一家增長中的公司來說，這也是一個非常典型的階段。我們會繼續(xù)構(gòu)建公司，不斷引入新人。（財富中文網(wǎng)） ????譯者：樸成奎 |
????Cloud storage company Box Inc. BOX 65.93% went public earlier today, raising $175 million. It was the culmination of a very long process for the decade-old company, which originally filed for the IPO last March but delayed pricing due to concerns that investors would be turned off by its massive losses. Box would calm those concerns a bit by more than doubling revenue for the year ending January 31, and already has seen its stock pop nearly 70% higher than the $14 per share IPO price. ????Fortune spoke to Box CEO Aaron Levie and CFO Dylan Smith today from The New York Stock Exchange. What follows is an edited transcript of our conversation: ????FORTUNE: It has been a long time since you first filed to go public. Why January 23? ????Levie:It was either this or January 22. ????Smith:We’ve always taken a very long-term view of the business, and had planned to go public both when we were ready and when the market was ready for us. It wasn’t always the most straight-forward path, but we’re thrilled to be where we are today… Our goal was to continue to execute and educate the market on our model and show leverage around our model. There were no specific milestones we were looking for. ????You once tweeted that “if your stock shoots up, you left money on the table.” Do you regret leaving so much money on the table? ????Levie:I can’t comment on the dynamics of the pricing process, but there are certain tweets that that won’t make as much sense anymore… We have a business model that requires you to understand the disruption going on in enterprise IT, and are very happy to have brought on strong investors who are committed to the re-platforming of the enterprise. ????Was there an unexpected question you heard repeatedly from prospective investors during the road show? ????Levie:Some of the misunderstanding of our business, and part of this is due to us being in a quiet period for eight or nine months, was that we are a storage company. We’re not. We are a software company with 80% gross margins that sells per seat. I think there was some initial confusion over that, and not understanding that storage is part of our infrastructure as opposed to something we sell. Users get unlimited storage, and pay us for our apps. That was already understood by people who have followed our company the closest, but not by people who were new to it. ????During your interview at Fortune Brainstorm Tech last July, you mentioned that one mistake Box made with the original filing timing was that, in the prior year, you had made a lot of costly investments that had not yet borne revenue fruit. Can you better explain that, and should investors expect similar expenditures in a year from now, or two? ????Levie:Around calendar 2012-2013 we did make a number of new investments. Things like international expansion and building up a field sales force. It takes time for those sales and marketing investments to kind of mature, and we’re now seeing those efficiencies play out in the business in our current fiscal year. We’ll continue to grow sales and marketing expenses over time, but they will decline as a percentage of revenue over time. ????Do you have any concerns that some employees will leave now that their vested stock options have become liquid securities? ????Levie:We have an entreprenurial culture, and I’m sure some employees are are very good in early-stage endeavors are likely to go do that. But we’ve been growing the team with very committed Boxers, which is what we call ourselves, and this is a very typical phase for a growing company. We’ll continue to build out the company and bring new people in. |
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