These Two Venture Firms Will Benefit the Most From Snap’s IPO
- Benchmark, Lightspeed to reap the bulk of the proceeds
- Once maligned, venture capital is now hot asset class again
Snap Files $3 Billion IPO: What Are Investors Buying?
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Snap Inc.’s initial public offering looks set to deliver windfalls to a long list of venture backers of the company behind the Snapchat social media app. But two will benefit more than most: Early investors Benchmark and Lightspeed Venture Partners.
Jeremy Liew, a partner at Lightspeed, tracked down Snap co-founder Evan Spiegel to pitch an initial investment of $485,000 in 2012 while Spiegel was still a sophomore at Stanford University. Lightspeed owns 86.6 million shares of the company today, according to the IPO S-1 filing.