Toast prices IPO at $40 per share, above ranges

Toast, a Boston-based restaurant management platform, raised $870 million in an IPO that values the company at nearly $20 billion. It priced at $40 per share, which was above its original and upwardly-revised ranges, and will list on the NYSE (TOST).

Why it matters: This is whiplash success story. Toast was valued by VCs at $5 billion heading into the pandemic, but in April 2020 laid off nearly half of its employees and furloughed another 12%.

Details: Toast reports a $235 million net loss on $704 million of revenue for the first half of 2021. It had raised around $900 million from firms like Tiger Global (12.8% pre-IPO stake), Bessemer Venture Partners (12.5%), T. Rowe Price (6%) and TCV (5.5%).

The bottom line: "Toast says it's serving more than 48,000 restaurant locations as of the end of June, up from 27,000 in 2019. Annual recurring revenue surged 118% in the second quarter from a year earlier to $494 million. The bulk of Toast's revenue comes from what the company calls financial technology solutions, consisting primarily of fees paid by customers for payment transactions. Less than 10% comes from subscriptions." — Ari Levy, CNBC