The lack of initial public offerings by Pacific Northwest tech companies had created a little bit of a glass ceiling on the GeekWire 200, with the top five in the rankings remaining static for months. But not anymore.
Apptio, which had been the number-four company on our ranking of the Pacific Northwest’s top privately held technology companies, went public this month. It was an impressive debut for the Bellevue-based company, which makes software to help CIOs better understand spending in IT departments. Apptio’s starting stock price of $16 per share soared to $22.55 by closing on its first day. Today, Apptio’s stock is sitting around $22.
Apptio is the second technology company from the Seattle area to go public this year, graduating from the GeekWire 200. The first was RFID software and chip maker Impinj. Founded 16 years ago, Impinj went public at $14 per share last month, and it is now trading at close to $38 per share.
With Apptio’s exit, Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture jumped into the top five this month, leap-frogging Act-On Software. Much like Elon Musk’s SpaceX, Blue Origin is taking aim at Mars, the moon and other deep-space destinations. One small step toward that goal is due to come next week, when Blue Origin puts its suborbital New Shepard spaceship through its most challenging flight test yet at the company’s launch site in West Texas.
DocuSign remains at number one this month, and the rest of the top five is made up of Redfin, Avalara, Blue Origin and Act-On Software.
Click for the full August update to the GeekWire 200 and continue reading for highlights.
The big movers this month include: Nvoicepay, up 42 spots to number 116; Gratafy, up 21 spots to number 128; Convoy, up 24 spots to number 132; CardTapp, up 30 spots to number 135; and VoltAthletics, up 17 spots to number 167.
Startups debuting on the GeekWire 200 this month include PicoBrew, Cozy, StudentRND, Thinkific and Ozlo Inc.
The GeekWire 200 — presented by our partners at EY — is derived from our broader list of more than 900 Pacific Northwest tech startups. The list is designed to provide a better understanding of the startup landscape in the Northwest. The ranking is generated from publicly available data, including social media followings, approximate employee counts and inbound web links.
To make sure your startup is eligible for inclusion in the GeekWire 200, first make sure it’s included in the broader Startup List. If so, there’s no need to submit it separately for the GeekWire 200. If your Pacific Northwest startup isn’t among the companies on that larger list, you can submit it for inclusion here, and our algorithm will crunch the numbers to see if your company makes next month’s GeekWire 200. (Please, no service providers, marketing agencies, etc.)
Thanks to everyone for checking out this month’s ranking. And, just a reminder, if you value resources like these, be sure to check out our list and map of out-of-town tech companies with Seattle engineering outposts as well as our list of startup incubators, co-working spaces and accelerators in the region, and our GeekWork job board.
