Ibotta filed an S-1 with confidence to the SEC on March 22, having already expressed its intention to list shares on the New York Stock Exchange. The 13-year-old cash-back startup is ready for its public debut, which will come after going profitable and achieving impressive revenue growth in 2023.

The company released 2023 revenue at $320 million, 52% ahead of 2022, which saw the company reporting $210 million. Gross profits from Ibotta had risen by 68% from 2022's $164.5 million to 2023's figures, $276 million.

Founded in Denver, the company originally functioned as an app providing cash back on purchases through Ibotta's brand partnerships. Since then, the company has grown into building back-end software for rewards programs for enterprise customers, including Exxon, Shell, and Walmart.

Ibotta's bet on B2B2C — selling to companies that then use those products to sell to consumers—is likely one reason investors are interested in this IPO, says Nicholas Smith, a senior equity research analyst at Renaissance Capital, a research firm focused on pre-IPO and IPO-focused ETFs. Selling to companies likely played a big role, too, in Ibotta's recent financial gains.

So the fact that it's become, with Walmart, more of an enterprise software play, basically being the back-end for its Walmart cash rewards program, that lends more credence to it," Smith said, recalling the company's presentation. "[Compared with] 'Hey, we have this app, and we need to grow users, and continue down that avenue.'

The company began building out its enterprise program, Ibotta performance network (IPN), in 2020. Walmart also began to partner with the company in 2020, but scaled up the scope of its IPN partnership within the retailing behemoth in 2022. "This partnership features massively in the increase in revenue of the company, as the S-1 claims.

Our revenue growth really accelerated with the addition of new publishers to the IPN, the S-1 says. Most recently, the rollout of our offers on the digital property of Walmart has attracted larger audiences, and in turn, resulted in greater spend by CPG brands and a greater number of redeemed offers. These developments have increased our scale, growth, and profitability.

Against the backdrop of the above comment by Ibotta, its direct-to-consumer business grew 19% from 2022 to 2023, a respectable amount. Its enterprise business, or "third-party publishers revenue," on the other hand increased 711% within the same timeframe, scaling from just under $10 million to just over $80 million in a year. That growth, and a corresponding improvement in its gross margins — from 78% in 2022 to around 86% in 2023 — enabled the company to emerge from persistent net losses and into steady profitability.

Quarterly data from Ibotta illustrates how recently, and how quickly, it became a profitable company. From Q1 2022 through Q1 2023, the company reported steady, declining net losses. The first quarter of 2022 brought negative net income to the tune of $22.9 million before falling to $4.3 million a year later. Then, since the second quarter of 2023, it began showing regular profit that had risen to $18.6 million in the last quarter of last year.

Revenue growth at a rapid pace, secondary revenue line expansion, improvement in quality of revenues and GAAP profits converged to make an IPO for Ibotta. If it falters with even those enabling features, late-stage venture-backed companies will be looking at its IPO as a classic warning story.

But there's a reason to believe that growth will keep coming. The company has IPN partnerships with Family Dollar, Kroger, Exxon and Shell to suggest wide corporate demand, though the depth of those relationships is less transparent than Ibotta's deal with Walmart. The S-1 didn't specify how long Ibotta's Walmart partnership is contracted for, but did say that if the retailer were to end the relationship, it would have a material impact on Ibotta's business.

The biggest question still is how Ibotta will price its shares. In all likelihood, the company chose to file its intent now-although it first hired bankers back in November-thereby riding on the recent wave of successful IPOs from Astera Labs and Reddit. Ibotta, though, is very different from each of those companies.

Secondary data platforms have seen very little, if any, secondary activity in terms of investor secondary transactions, Ibotta said, with the company further commenting that secondary markets may be active for a variety of different reasons. On the valuation side, the pricing could go a few different ways considering the company has multiple revenue streams that traditionally get valued quite differently, said Smith.

"It's tough because there isn't a great comp, not one that fits perfectly," Smith said. "It is a little bit of an adtech company maybe moving more into enterprise software. [If] looked at truly from a tech perspective, it will probably go for a pretty high multiple, and if it's more sort of adtech or even consumer, it might be lower."

But Smith said that if investors value it more as an ad or marketing company, it may be priced similarly to how the digital marketing company Klaviyo was priced last fall. Klaviyo priced at $31 a share, $1 above its target of $30, which gave it a valuation of $9.2 billion, a hair below its previous primary round valuation of $9.5 billion. The company's current market cap is $6.8 billion.

Ibotta has raised a little over $90 million in venture capital from funds including GGV Capital, Great Oak Ventures, and Teamworth Ventures, among others, in addition to a slew of angel investors that includes Thomas Jermoluk and Jim Clark, the co-founders of Beyond Identity. The company had last been valued at $1.08 billion.