The venture capital-backed IPO market in Europe has been muted this year, but investor sentiment is warming, setting the stage for a potential 2025 rebound.
So far, only 10 IPOs have closed, according to PitchBook data, which would imply another decade-low total for the year at the current rate. Exit value shot up from last year, standing at €12.8 billion, but that figure can mostly be attributed to Spanish beauty group Puig’s listing in May.
While activity is low, there have been green shoots of recovery in Q2, with the number of listings improving after the European Central Bank’s interest rate cut. Furthermore, venture growth valuations rebounded at the beginning of the year with the median standing at €21.7 in Q1 compared to €20.7 million for full-year 2023, according to PitchBook’s Q1 2024 European VC Valuations Report.
Europe has a strong pipeline of companies reading to go public, including London-based challenger bank Revolut which has hinted at IPO plans.
Here are the region’s 10 venture-backed companies with the highest likelihood of going public. The list was created using PitchBook’s VC Exit Predictor, which calculates exit probability using a machine learning model that is fed historical and real-time data on private company exits. The predictor draws from 34 inputs related to company characteristics, financing and investors.8
Featured image of the London Stock Exchange by Chris J Ratcliffe/Getty Images
