[Updated, 5:45pm] Ding, ding. Rapid7 CEO Corey Thomas rang the opening bell at the Nasdaq this morning, and the Boston area’s first tech IPO of 2015 is in the books.
Rapid7 (NASDAQ: [[ticker:RPD]]) raised $103.2 million by selling 6.45 million shares at $16 a pop, which was above the expected price range. The cybersecurity company’s pre-trading valuation was $605 million.
Rapid7’s stock opened this morning at $26.75, up 67 percent from its IPO share price, which shows a lot of demand for the shares. The stock has been trading between $25 and $28 in its first hour. It closed the day at $25.28. [Updated with first-day closing price—Eds.]
Thomas (at center in photo) took over as CEO in 2012 from Mike Tuchen, who led the company from 2009-2012. Tuchen should also be celebrating today, as he is one of the company’s top shareholders. He actually told me just before the CEO transition that Rapid7 would IPO rather than get acquired. (Tuchen is currently CEO of Silicon Valley-based Talend, a data integration company.)
Thomas said in a statement: “As IT infrastructure becomes increasingly complex and attackers increase in numbers, motives and sophistication, we believe security practices must change. Organizations are shifting from reactive, compliance-driven security programs that are focused on ‘block and protect’ prevention to analytics-driven risk-based programs that actively reduce and manage risks to the organization. Rapid7’s IT security data and analytics solutions empower organizations to better secure their dynamic IT environments and are core to this active approach.”
For those keeping score across sectors, today’s deal makes it 8-1, biotech IPOs to tech IPOs in Massachusetts this year.
It’s a scarce market for tech IPOs nationally. All eyes will be on Rapid7’s stock performance—especially the eyes of other cybersecurity companies that might soon follow in its footsteps. Chief among those locally are Veracode, Bit9, and Mimecast.
We’ll update this space with further developments.
Photo credit: Nasdaq2015
