It turns out Nutanix really is worth $2 billion.
Nutanix went public today at $16 per share, higher than the company’s revised price range. Trading opened at $26.50, and the share price had climbed to $33.82 as of press time.
A $16-per-share price represents a market capitalization of around $2.2 billion. At the time of its final venture funding round, a $140 million Series E, Nutanix’s valuation was said to exceed $2 billion.
A lack of tech IPOs made Nutanix a closely watched offering. When the company increased its price range earlier this week, it was a good indication that the IPO was going to be hot.
Trading of Nutanix shares began midmorning, and the volume reached 12 million within one hour. By contrast, Cisco, which had been trading for about two-and-a-half hours at that point, had a volume of 10 million.
Although Nutanix has grown steeply, the company hasn’t been profitable — losses for the year ending July 2016 were $168 million. Moreover, the company is facing determined competition in hyperconverged infrastructure, maybe more so now that Dell and EMC have completed their merger.
Photo: Vivek_bathina on Twitter.