For better or worse, big e-commerce sites and huge social media apps probably won't be choking the public markets this year.
Not that there won't be any making it to the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. But lots of stars have made progress last year on the enterprise technology scene. They might not all be profitable, but they sure have attracted hefty rounds of venture funding.
Here we are in 2014, and a whole bunch of hot tech companies are considering initial public offerings (IPOs) this year. We've given you our best guesses below on the likelihood each of these players will actually pull the trigger. Feel free to share your views and predictions in the comments section.
But while the pipeline certainly has its share of companies focused on doing business with businesses, plenty of tech companies with services for just about anyone also made the cut.
- Airbnb: The social home-renting company's valuation exceeded the billion-dollar mark back in 2011. Likelihood of 2014 IPO: 80 percent.
- Eventbrite: IPO talk has been going on for the better part of two years now. A $60 million round came in April. Likelihood of 2014 IPO: 75 percent.
- Pinterest: This social media site for people to aggregate their favorite content recently had a $3.8 billion valuation, hot off a $225 million round. Yet it's been thinking up ways to bring in money, so it might want to sit on a public offering a little while yet. But anything is possible. Likelihood of 2014 IPO: 55 percent.
- Evernote: Raised $85 million in November 2012, back when it had 45 million users. The user base has since swelled to roughly 80 million, including both free and paid users. Last February Chief Executive Phil Libin said a public offering would be possible in 2015 or 2016. A lot can change in a year, though. Likelihood of 2014 IPO: 45 percent.
- Snapchat: It's hard to keep up with the latest valuation for this ephemeral-social-messaging app maker. And, like Pinterest, Snapchat could have a situation when it comes to revenue. But the company did just officially raise $50 million, only half a year after a $60 million round. Likelihood of 2014 IPO: 40 percent.
Without question, those companies boast high profiles. But last year, enterprise-focused companies such as Veeva Systems and Tableau Software came through with the best exits in terms of valuation at the time of exit relative to how much money they've raised, as VentureBeat's Christina Farr reported.
Considering that so many business-to-business companies look poised to hit public markets in the coming months, plenty of them have a shot at delivering better exits than consumer companies for another year.