Copenhagen-based Trustpilot, an online platform for consumer reviews, has announced its plan to launch its IPO on the London stock exchange.
London IPO
Trustpilot mentions that it would have a free float of at least 25 per cent of issued share capital and may raise approx $50M (approx €41.5M) capital for growth and to repay debt. Furthermore, it is also expected that shares representing up to a further 15 per cent of the offer will be made available pursuant to an over-allotment option.
Besides, Trustpilot will also allow existing shares to be sold by certain existing shareholders, directors, and employees. Reportedly, the firm is targeting a valuation of around £1B (approx €1.15B). Trustpilot is aiming for a premium listing segment of the Official List of the FCA and expects eligibility for inclusion in FTSE UK indices as a result.
Peter Holten Mühlmann, CEO of Trustpilot comments, “Today is a significant landmark in our development. We believe that an IPO of the business will allow us to continue the momentum of recent years, providing a platform to deliver new products to more geographies, and succeed in our vision to become a universal symbol of trust.”
JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley are global coordinators on the deal and bookrunners along with Berenberg and Danske Bank.
Let’s talk numbers
Trustpilot has experienced strong growth on its platform. As of 31st December 2020, over 529,000 domains (both claimed and unclaimed, and including domains subsequently removed from the Trustpilot consumer website) had been reviewed.
In addition, the platform had hosted over 120 million reviews by consumers (including reviews subsequently removed or deleted) and had over 19,500 premium customers for its SaaS products and services.
Trustpilot believes that bookings in any given period are a leading indicator of revenue in the subsequent periods. The company had bookings of $75.2M (approx €62.4M) in 2018, $95.6M (approx €79.33M) in 2019, and $113.2M (approx €93.9M) in 2020, while total revenues were $64.3M (approx €53.35M), $81.9M (approx €67.96M), and $102M (approx €84.65M) for the years ended 31 December 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively.
Mühlmann says, “We have experienced strong growth as both consumers and business have joined, attracted to Trustpilot’s truly open platform where the integrity of reviews is critical. This growth has been supported by investment in a best-in-class technology platform. Accessible tools and analytics are provided by systems able to securely process 1,800 terabytes of data per month, and our AI tools also seek out and remove fake reviews.”
Everything about Trustpilot
Trustpilot was founded in 2007 by Peter Holten Mühlmann (CEO), with a vision to create an independent currency of trust. Mühlmann says, “Trust is one of a company’s hardest credentials to prove but among the most important to consumers. Our mission is to become a universal symbol of trust, empowering consumers to make confident, informed purchasing decisions while allowing businesses to fill the trust gap by demonstrating the quality of their services and gain actionable insights to improve it.”
Trustpilot provides an open platform, where businesses and consumers can gain actionable insights and collaborate. Consumers are able to share feedback about any business with a website and review feedback left by other consumers.
The platform not only facilitates better purchasing decisions but also gives consumers the opportunity to recommend businesses, products, services, and locations based on their experiences.
For businesses, they can use Trustpilot to engage with consumers that are reviewing their products and services as well as respond to consumer reviews. To make the platform legit, Trustpilot prevents businesses from choosing which reviews are published on, or removed from, its platform, so that all reviews can be seen by consumers.
The company offers paid subscription models for businesses, providing increasing levels of functionality and offered on a SaaS basis. For example, business customers are able to showcase reviews from consumers in their own marketing materials, access actionable insights gleaned from Trustpilot’s big-data ecosystem, gain insights from Trustpilot’s proprietary data analytics software, and benefit from automated review invitation capabilities.