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If the stock market does indeed open up to high-tech offerings this year, put Opentable high on the list. Word in Silicon Valley is that the restaurant booking system has hired, or is hiring, bankers to lead an initial public offering. We have no idea whom. The more breathless estimates put the value of the online reservation system — used by more than 6,000 mainly high-end restaurants to take an aggregate $900m a year worth of bookings — as high as $1bn. Hard to believe, but stranger deals have happened. If Opentable does go public, it will be vindication for Benchmark Capital's Bill Gurley. The gangly venture capitalist is a long-time prophet of online retail who spent years in the wilderness before his bubble-era investments finally came good. Amusingly, Opentable has already been touted as a candidate for a public offering: back in 2000, when it made the Upside Hot 100. Gurley only had to wait seven years.
Opentable gearing for $1bn stock market debut
If the stock market does indeed open up to high-tech offerings this year, put Opentable high on the list. Word in Silicon Valley is that the restaurant booking system has hired, or is hiring, bankers to lead an initial public offering. We have no idea whom. The more breathless estimates put the value of the online reservation system — used by more than 6,000 mainly high-end restaurants to take an aggregate $900m a year worth of bookings — as high as $1bn. Hard to believe, but stranger deals have happened. If Opentable does go public, it will be vindication for Benchmark Capital's Bill Gurley. The gangly venture capitalist is a long-time prophet of online retail who spent years in the wilderness before his bubble-era investments finally came good. Amusingly, Opentable has already been touted as a candidate for a public offering: back in 2000, when it made the Upside Hot 100. Gurley only had to wait seven years.
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8:41 AM on Wed Mar 7 2007
By Nick Denton
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