Half into 2024, the US stock market saw 81 initial public offerings (IPOs). If the trend continues, it will align with the 154 IPOs in 2023, far from the all-time record-breaking year of 2021 with 1,035 IPOs.
In the UK’s London Stock Exchange (LSE), these investing vehicles are rare given the economy’s contraction and stagnation. Three of the six IPOs launched in 2024 on the alternative investment market (AIM). However, Raspberry Pi Holdings PLC (LSE: RPI) is one of the main launches in the market.
Having started trading on Tuesday on LSE, Raspberry Pi stock opened at 360 GBX (Pence Sterling), now trading at 385.60 GBX, which translates to $4.91 per RPI share. At press time, the highest RPI price level was 390 GBX.
However, this is only reserved for select investors via conditional trading. The retail trading of Raspberry Pi stock starts on June 14th (Friday). Here is what investors should know about Raspberry Pi’s entry into the stock market.
Raspberry’s Fusion of Charity with Capital Goals
The initial pricing of Raspberry Pi IPO shares puts the company’s valuation at around £541.6 million ($688.8 million). Based in Cambridge, Raspberry Pi’s leadership hopes to expand operations to build more products to “make computing accessible and affordable for everybody.”
In other words, the company outgrew its charity origins to become more effective. The CEO, Eben Upton, founded the Raspberry Pi Foundation in 2009, coming out of the University of Cambridge’s Computer Laboratory. Ever since the foundation has been building compact and cheap single-board computers.
The first model was priced at around $30, while the latest-gen Raspberry Pi 5 has all the modern computing features. Its price starts at around $64, depending on the wide range of configurations centered around Arm’s chip architecture.
In 2012, the foundation launched its incorporated subsidiary Raspberry Pi Ltd to scale up the marketing and distribution of its computers. Outlined in the foundation’s 2025 strategy, Raspberry Pi’s long-term goals revolve around advancing non-formal learning, education and research.
The goals center the younger demographic (5-25) interfacing with computing at the lowest cost possible. The commercial aspect of Raspberry Pi, now enhanced with a publicly traded company, follows the previous path of donated profits from Raspberry Pi Ltd sales.
What Kind of Raspberry Pi Sales Volumes Can Investors Expect?
In this dynamic between regular philanthropic donations, government (education) contracts, and Raspberry Pi Ltd sales, the latter accounted for $66 million in gross profit during 2023, from the total revenue of $266 million across 60 million devices sold.
The nature of Raspberry Pi products positions the company within the embedded category, making 72% of its sales in fiscal year 2023. Most of the revenue comes from Europe (38%), but it is relatively evenly distributed across North America (29%) and Asia (26%). This points to the foundation’s successful alignment with its global education goals.
According to Fortune Business Insights, the embedded systems market will grow at a CAGR of 7.1% from 2023 to 2030, from $100.04 billion to $161.86 billion.
As previously noted, the company relies on a strategic partnership with Arm Holdings (NASDAQ:ARM), a British semiconductor architecture designer found in most mobile devices. In April 2023, Raspberry Pi Ltd. received a strategic investment from its other partnership, Sony (NYSE:SONY) Semiconductor Solutions Corporation (“SSS”).
“Our goal is to provide new value to a variety of industries and support them in solving issues using our innovative edge AI sensing technology built around image sensors,”
Terushi Shimizu, CEO of Sony Semiconductor Solutions Corporation (SSS)
Owing to its open and modular design philosophy, Raspberry Pi already offers the Hailo-8L accelerator module for the aforementioned Raspberry Pi 5. The platform is also AI-ready for machine learning and computer vision within its Raspberry Pi AI Kit.
Given the popularity of AI and the need to learn its workings to stay competitive, Raspberry Pi’s stock is likely to gain $5 per share once retail trading is enabled on Friday. For now, the US stock market launch is not on the table.
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Neither the author, Tim Fries, nor this website, The Tokenist, provide financial advice. Please consult our website policy prior to making financial decisions.