Bending Spoons IPOs at ~$25B, twice its $11B private valuation from October 2025
Bending Spoons debuted on Nasdaq at $29/share, popping to a ~$25B market cap — double its $11B private mark — on a roll-up of 50-plus brands including AOL, Vimeo, and Evernote that turned $1.31B in 2025 revenue from about 620 core staff. The model is private-equity mechanics without the exit: buy loved-but-stalled products, hold forever, and lift margins through AI, price hikes, and deep layoffs. Revenue per core employee climbed from $1.12M in 2023 to $2.57M in 2025, and the firm expects only a few hundred of the 1,830 acquired AOL, Eventbrite, and Vimeo staff to remain past 2026.
Source: techcrunch.com ↗
Revenue per full-time equivalent Spooner increased from $1.12 million in 2023 to $2.57 million in 2025.
Bending Spoons filing
Why this matters
- → Validates PE-style consolidation model for software without exit pressure.
- → 500M+ users across portfolio demonstrates scale beyond 'dead brands' narrative.
- → IPO doubles valuation; signals investor appetite for aggressive margin expansion via AI and layoffs.
PE playbook goes public