Slack’s non-IPO

Slack’s going public today, but don’t call it an IPO.

Instead, Slack is pursuing a direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange (under the ticker “WORK”), forgoing the IPO process to reduce the number of banks involved and costs in IPO-related fees. The company has set a reference point of $26 per share for the listing, valuing the company around ~$16B.

Do direct listings sound familiar? Though they’re rare (only companies in great financial shape tend to pursue them), Spotify also went public via direct listing last year.

Slack is the latest in the slew of tech companies to go public this year, and our new favorite game is taking trips down Product Hunt memory lane. Some of our favorite Slack comments:

“So good. The iOS app crushes Hipchat's. Our team made the switch and we haven't looked back.” - Will

“Yeah, we tried it too and it hasn't stuck. Butterfield seems to build these beautiful games/tools that miss something core.” - Derek

“I don't know how my team survived without Slack previously. We switched from Skype (could never get on with Hipchat) and haven't looked back. The search is miles better, the mobile apps are incredible, and the integrations with things like Trello, ProdPad and MailChimp just make it a no-brainer.” - Janna

“Quite simply, our business depends on Slack.” - Jamie

Slack is one of the biggest new B2B platforms to launch in recent history, and we’ve seen a lot of bots created since its launch. A sampling:

🍩 Donut for Onboarding makes onboarding easy, in Slack

👋 Notify gives you a Slack notification when your startup is mentioned online

🙌 Halp is a Slack-first internal ticketing system

🌚 Sblack is a lightweight Mac client for Slack

💪 Paste is a presentation tool for Slack

📹 Slack Video Messaging lets you record and send videos in Slack

⭕ Tic-tac-toe for a game in Slack

👍 Suttna is a check-in app for Slack

🙃 Slackmojis is a directory of custom Slack emojis

😂 Slacker lets you post funny replies as different characters

And there are sooo many more. Check them all out here 👇

NEW POD! This week, we caught up with Gumroad founder and CEO Sahil Lavingia about:

📈 Gumroad's ups and downs
👀 Why relationships in Silicon Valley are so transactional
🧐 Watching successful founders try to find themselves in public

Listen here.