Public or perish? From founding to initial public offering

Abstract

AbstractWe examine the factors affecting the time to initial public offering (IPO), using a sample of more than 10,000 start-up firms in Japan. We provide evidence that start-up firms engaging in innovative and uncertain businesses are more likely to go public earlier than other firms. The results also reveal that start-up firms that rely on equity financing at founding are more likely to go public earlier than others. Moreover, we find that start-up firms in highly valued industries are more likely to go public earlier than in other industries and that the likelihood of an IPO among start-up firms depends on market conditions.