Travel Software Startup Navan to File This Month for Fall IPO
Travel software startup is one of several companies going public as tech offerings pick up.
The Takeaway
• Navan will file confidentially amid pickup in offerings
• Company is backed by Andreessen Horowitz and Lightspeed Venture Partners
• Tech IPOs are coming at fastest pace since the start of the drought in mid-2023
Navan, a corporate travel software startup, is planning to file confidentially for an initial public offering as early as next week, two people familiar with the matter said, a further sign of a rebound in public listings for venture-backed startups.
The company, backed by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Andreessen Horowitz, is one of a handful of VC-backed software firms that have taken recent steps to go public this year. Others include designer-focused company Figma and cybersecurity startup Netskope. Each company is at least 10 years old and faces pressure from employees and investors to sell shares.
Navan, formerly known as TripActions, is among the dozens of aging startups that have been preparing, on and off, for IPOs for several years. Navan is working with Goldman Sachs as its lead underwriter for an IPO in the fall. Confidential IPO filings kick off a monthslong process with securities regulators before companies release those filings publicly and then launch their investor road shows. (See our Tech IPO Tracker for more details.)
A Navan spokesperson declined to comment.
Another startup that’s been aiming for an IPO for years is banking app Chime, which went public Wednesday at $27 a share, slightly above its initial price range. Shares were set to start trading significantly above the offer price Thursday.
Navan’s business cratered during the pandemic, when corporate travel collapsed. It generated about $540 million in revenue in its last fiscal year, which ended in January, up by more than one-third from the previous year, another person said. The company was still burning cash last year. It is run by CEO Ariel Cohen, a former Israeli tank commander, who has a reputation for a blunt and polarizing management style, The Information previously reported.
The company was last valued at $9.2 billion in 2022, according to PitchBook. The price it is seeking in the IPO isn’t known. A string of venture capital–backed companies have gone public at lower valuations than in their prior private rounds of funding, including Chime at more than $11 billion, down from $25 billion.
Navan competes with SAP Concur and American Express Global Business Travel Group to sell travel booking and expense management software. The company says its software is easier to use and more personalized than its rivals’. In a 2022 investor presentation, it compared itself to a “personalized ‘Amazon for travel’ experience.”
The company raised its earliest funding from Zeev Ventures, Lightspeed and Andreessen. It later raised debt from Greenoaks and Coatue Management. Navan would be one of a few Lightspeed-backed companies to go public recently, including data backup software firm Rubrik, which went public last year, and Netskope, which is aiming for the fall.
Just 20 tech companies went public in the last two years, well below historic norms, but activity is picking up. Six tech firms have gone public in the last three months, the most in any three-month span since the start of the IPO drought in mid-2023.
Shares of the 20 tech companies are up an average of 75% from their IPO price since their listing dates, according to Morgan Stanley. That’s significantly higher gains than for the overall Nasdaq composite over that period.
Some newly issued tech stocks have soared even higher, thanks in part to enthusiasm from retail traders. Those include AI cloud provider CoreWeave and stablecoin issuer Circle.
Ticket marketplace StubHub is also planning to go public as soon as this summer, and buy now, pay later company Klarna is likely to go public in the fall. Both firms delayed IPOs in the spring, in the wake of tariff-induced stock market volatility.