Yelp may have just turned down a half-billion dollar takeover offer from Google. Zynga does a crazy-big $180m funding. Not long ago, Twitter took another $100-million in financing, and now we learn it’s … profitable. In the immortal words of Walter Sobchak, has the whole world – or least every young and fast-growing technology company -- gone crazy?
Maybe, but there could also be something important going on. It’s been so long since it last happened that most people will have forgotten, but there is often a reason why companies start doing strange things, like taking lots of money when they don’t need it, and like turning down appealing acquisitions. The reason? This thing called an “initial public offering” (IPO).
Original Article: Netscape, Yelp, and the Tech IPO Boom of 2010
