Predictions of a grand IPO rebound in 2026 have yet to come true in the form of new filings and major debuts.
Nonetheless, the first couple months of the year have brought a steady stream of market entries from companies in sectors such as construct...
Predictions of a grand IPO rebound in 2026 have yet to come true in the form of new filings and major debuts.
Nonetheless, the first couple months of the year have brought a steady stream of market entries from companies in sectors such as construction tech, space tech and biotech. Noticeably absent, however, are new offerings from SaaS companies, long an IPO market staple.
Per Crunchbase data, 11 venture- or seed-backed U.S. companies went public on major exchanges so far this year, raising just over $3 billion. Comparatively, that’s a fairly robust showing for the first couple months of the year, which tends to be a reasonably active period for IPOs.
Looking at recent years charted below, the first couple months of 2026 are well above the bottom ranks, but still far below the 2021 market peak for volume of offerings and total raised.
Leading offerings weren’t your typical VC-backed deals
The lineup of companies going public so far this year, however, includes many that don’t look like your typical VC-backed offering.
This includes the year’s largest VC-funded IPO: EquipmentShare, a service that provides construction equipment rentals and support for building projects. The 11-year-old, Columbia, Missouri-based company raised more than $700 million in its January offering and had a recent market cap of over $7 billion.
The second-largest debut was also somewhat of an outlier: space tech company York Space Systems, which is majority-owned by private equity firm AE Industrial Partners. It’s down from its initial trading price but recently valued around $3.4 billion.
Per Crunchbase data, there have been six IPOs of venture-backed companies this year that raised $200 million or more, which we list below.
SaaS squashed
It’s also noteworthy who isn’t on the list. For years, enterprise software companies have been among the more reliable IPO market entrants. This year, however, they’ve been notably absent as the sector contends with an extended selloff fueled partly by concerns of AI-abetted disruption.
We’re also not seeing SaaS companies in the immediate IPO pipeline. A perusal of new IPO filings so far this year showed no venture-backed SaaS unicorns that submitted a new IPO filing in 2026.
It’s a sharp contrast to just a few months ago. One of last year’s splashiest IPOs — design software platform Figma — is now down more than two-thirds from its peak. Another of the more recent big SaaS offerings — business travel and expense platform Navan — has shed more than half its value.
Meanwhile, Blackstone-backed Liftoff, which provides tools for marketers and app developers, withdrew its planned IPO this month, amid the software route. It’s likely a delay, as Reuters reported that Liftoff filed a new confidential plan shortly afterward.
IPO market in an odd place
Overall, the IPO market is in an odd place at the moment. It’s an unfriendly scene for companies with business models viewed as vulnerable to AI-driven displacement. At the same time, there’s still continued buzz around the potential for record-setting offerings from SpaceX, Anthropic and OpenAI.
Of those, the one rumored to be closest on the horizon is SpaceX, newly combined with xAI at a reported $1.25 trillion valuation. The company is said to be eyeing a market debut as early as this summer.
If that happens, and the current SaaS squeeze continues, it wouldn’t be surprising to see a pattern of record-setting IPO returns coinciding with a very small number of actual debuts.
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Illustration: Dom Guzman
