Eventbrite Punches Exit Ticket

For all the venture capitalist–inspired hype around tech startups, it’s always good to remember that many are too niche to ever amount to anything—and should never go public. We got a reminder of that on Tuesday when Italian conglomerate Bending Spoons said it would buy ticketing firm Eventbrite for $500 million in cash. That’s a stunning comedown for a company that went public in 2018 with a market value of about $1.7 billion. 

Bending Spoons is paying $4.50 a share for Eventbrite, which sold the same shares in the IPO for $23 apiece (and Bending Spoons is being generous, given that Eventbrite shares on Monday were trading at $2.50). But if you look back in time, such an outcome might not be a surprise. As we wrote in this piece in 2018, Eventbrite had a “compelling origin story of a now-husband-and-wife duo” who founded the firm, but the business was never exactly a rocket ship. While it showed steady growth, there were signs it was slowing even before it went public. Not long after the IPO, problems emerged.