Bending Spoons Files for $1.5B Nasdaq IPO at Roughly $20B Valuation
- Bending Spoons filed a Form F-1 with the SEC to list on Nasdaq under the ticker BSP, with an estimated $1.5 billion raise and a roughly $20 billion valuation [1]
- Trailing 12-month revenue reached $1.6 billion as of March 31, 2026, with 2025 full-year revenue of $1.31 billion — up 95% year-on-year [2]
- Monthly active users grew to 500 million from 111 million in December 2023, with paying customers tripling to 9 million [3]
- The company swung to a $27.5 million net profit in Q1 2026 from a $112.2 million loss a year earlier [3]
- Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, and Allen & Company are leading the offering, with a dual-class share structure preserving founder control [2]
Bending Spoons, the Milan-based serial acquirer behind Eventbrite, Vimeo, AOL, and WeTransfer, filed a Form F-1 registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday for an initial public offering on the Nasdaq Global Select Market. The company plans to trade under the ticker BSP [1][4].
Renaissance Capital estimates the offering at roughly $1.5 billion, which would value Bending Spoons at approximately $20 billion — nearly double the $11.7 billion valuation from an equity raise just eight months ago [1][5]. Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, and Allen & Company are leading the deal, with BofA Securities, Jefferies, Wells Fargo Securities, Evercore ISI, and several European banks rounding out the syndicate [2].
The filing reveals a company growing at an unusual pace through acquisition. Bending Spoons reported $1.31 billion in revenue for 2025, up 95% from the prior year, and trailing 12-month revenue of $1.6 billion through March 31, 2026 [1][3]. Monthly active users across its portfolio reached 500 million in March 2026, up from 111 million in December 2023 [3].
The Business
Founded in 2013, Bending Spoons operates what it describes as a compounding acquisition machine: it buys digital businesses, restructures them to expand earnings, and reinvests proceeds into additional deals [1]. The company has completed more than 50 acquisitions to date, assembling a portfolio of consumer and enterprise software brands that span video hosting (Vimeo), ticketing (Eventbrite), note-taking (Evernote), file transfer (WeTransfer), internet services (AOL), time tracking (Harvest), cycling navigation (Komoot), live streaming (StreamYard), and video infrastructure (Brightcove) [2].
Ten businesses — AOL, Brightcove, Eventbrite, Evernote, Harvest, Komoot, Remini, StreamYard, Vimeo, and WeTransfer — generated more than 80% of Q1 2026 revenue [3]. Subscriptions accounted for 93% of 2025 sales, with a 95% annual net revenue retention rate. Seventy-nine percent of new-customer revenue in 2025 came through organic acquisition, with advertising consuming just 6% of annual revenue [3].
The Financials
Bending Spoons posted $601.3 million in revenue in Q1 2026 alone, more than double the $258.9 million it recorded in Q1 2025 [3]. Full-year 2025 operating profit reached $278 million, more than doubling from $127 million in 2024 [3].
The company swung to a net profit of $27.5 million in Q1 2026, compared with a net loss of $112.2 million in the same quarter a year earlier. Q1 2026 operating income was $120.2 million, versus a $4.6 million operating loss in Q1 2025 [3]. The dramatic improvement reflects both the revenue ramp from recent acquisitions and the aggressive cost restructuring Bending Spoons applies to the businesses it buys.
Share Structure and Control
The IPO will use a dual-class share structure. Class A shares, carrying five votes each, will be held by the four co-founders — Matteo Danieli, CEO Luca Ferrari, Francesco Patarnello, and Luca Querella — preserving their control over the company post-listing [3]. Public investors will receive Class B shares with one vote each.
Bending Spoons had previously filed confidentially with the SEC on March 13, 2026, before making its F-1 public on June 8 [1]. Pricing terms, including the number of shares to be offered and a price range, have not yet been disclosed.
AI as an Operational Lever
The F-1 highlights Bending Spoons' aggressive adoption of AI in its engineering operations. AI-authored or co-authored pull requests increased from under 10% of total pull requests in Q1 2025 to over 90% in Q1 2026, with approximately 70% written entirely by AI [3]. The company positions this as a key driver of its ability to operate a large portfolio of products with relatively lean teams.
What's Next
The filing does not include a specific pricing date or expected share count. At a $20 billion valuation, Bending Spoons would rank among the largest European-founded tech IPOs to list in the U.S. in recent years [5]. The company's trajectory — from a small Italian app studio to a $1.6 billion-revenue platform in just over a decade — will test investor appetite for a roll-up model more commonly associated with private equity than consumer technology.
The broad syndicate of 14 bookrunners, spanning Wall Street and European banks including UniCredit, Intesa Sanpaolo, and BNP Paribas, signals the company's intent to attract both U.S. and European institutional capital [1][2].
Further sources
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