Mulesoft kicks higher on IPO debut

Mulesoft, the provider of cloud-based business software, enjoyed a strong Wall Street debut on Friday, with its stock kicking more than 45% higher in opening hours.

The San-Francisco company, which has taken the ticker MULE, priced its initial public offer (IPO) at $17 per share, above its indicated price range of $14 to $16, and by 1630 GMT had leapt to $24.73.

Mulesoft floated 13m of its shares on the New York Stock Exchange to raise an IPO total of $221m and to give it an opening market capitalisation of $3.05bn.

Last year the company made a loss of roughly $48m, down almost a quarter on the previous year, on $187.7m of revenue that was up around 70%, according to its IPO filing.

Customers of its application integration technology, which allow coders to integrate apps with others more easily, include Anheuser-Busch, Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Spotify and Unilever.

Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan acted as joint lead book-running managers for the IPO, with BofA Merrill Lynch an active book-running manager.