Snowflake Prices IPO Above Marketed Range at $120 a Share

(Bloomberg) -- All eyes are on cloud-data software maker Snowflake Inc.’s trading debut after it raised $3.36 billion in the year’s biggest U.S. initial public offering for an operating company and the largest in software ever.

The San Mateo, California-based company is set to list on the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday under the symbol SNOW. It sold 28 million shares Tuesday for $120 apiece, above an already elevated range, according to a statement. The shares were marketed at $100 to $110 apiece, boosted from $75 to $85 earlier.

The listing ranks as the biggest U.S. IPO this year, excluding the $4 billion offering by the special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, backed by billionaire Bill Ackman.

Snowflake is valued in the IPO at more than $33 billion based on the outstanding shares listed in its prospectus. That compares with a valuation of $12.4 billion in a private funding round announced in February.

It’s a busy week for IPOs as technology and other companies rush to get in the door ahead of the Nov. 3 U.S. presidential election. Sumo Logic Inc. and Unity Software Inc. are among 15 companies going public this week, seeking to raise a combined $8.3 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. JFrog Inc., which priced its $509 million IPO above target, is also expected to begin trading Wednesday.

Snowflake lured Warren Buffett for a rare investment in an IPO. Berkshire Hathaway Inc. and Salesforce Ventures, an arm of Salesforce.com Inc., have each committed to buy $250 million of the company’s Class A common stock in a private placement. Berkshire has also agreed to buy 4 million shares in a secondary transaction, according to Snowflake’s filing.

Snowflake, founded in 2012, is a rare challenger to Amazon.com Inc. as a provider of data warehouse technology, which compiles information from different systems so clients can analyze it together in the same place. In the fiscal year that ended Jan. 31, Snowflake’s revenue soared 174% to $264.7 million compared with the previous fiscal year, the company reported. In the sixth months that ended July 31, sales were $242 million, a 133% year-over-year increase.

The Snowflake offering is being led by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley.

(A previous version of this story was corrected to show it’s not Buffett’s first ever IPO investment)

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