Figma confidentially files for much awaited US IPO after $20 billion Adobe deal collapse

By Jaiveer Shekhawat

(Reuters) -Cloud-based designer platform Figma on Tuesday confidentially filed for an initial public offering in the United States, more than a year after a $20 billion deal to be acquired by Adobe was shelved due to regulatory roadblocks.

Figma had been widely considered as a candidate to go public after antitrust regulators in Europe and Britain blocked Adobe's deal in December 2023 in what would have been one of the biggest acquisitions of a software startup.

Last year, Figma was valued at $12.5 billion after it closed a deal to allow its employees and early investors to sell their stake to new and existing investors.

The U.S. IPO market, which made a strong comeback last year from a slew of high-profile listings, has been rattled by market volatility stemming from tariff-related uncertainty, with companies adopting a wait-and-see approach before proceeding with their stock market debuts.

"Sentiment for the IPO market is relatively low and has been dampened by heightened market volatility stemming from a lack of policy clarity. Over the past few months, we saw a string of tech startups filing to go public, but many subsequently put their IPO plan on hold," said Kaidi Gao, senior VC analyst at PitchBook.

Figma, a design platform with both free and paid offerings, is used to create, share and test designs for websites, mobile apps and other digital products, boasts customers such as Adobe, Uber, Spotify and Alphabet's search-engine giant Google.

The company, co-founded by tech executive Dylan Field in 2012, is cash flow positive and has expanded its offerings to include a broader platform for team collaborations with artificial intelligence features.

(Reporting by Jaiveer Singh Shekhawat in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath and Alan Barona)