I would imagine that most companies that are gearing up for IPO feel well-known to the tech community, but are mostly unknown to the outside world.
For example, with Slack, if I asked my non-tech friends, most would would have no idea what that is.
I would have thought the same, but I spent the past winter holidays speaking to a number of interested friends / family members about our company, which is fairly technical. The first question I always asked as a lead-in was, “have you ever heard of or used Slack?”
The answer was yes across the board.
They’re the fastest growing SaaS company ever. Don’t underestimate the power of exponential growth over the period of even a few months.
Increasingly though these entities are more interested in direct connections with management teams, thus cutting out middle men like Goldman Sachs.
This dynamic is what drives entities like Goldman Sachs to invest in late stage rounds so as to build a deep understanding of the business prior to IPO.
It’s so great that more companies are going “straight to the money”.
Deep well, not monopoly.
The amount of money a company potentially loses is massive.