We all figured this was going to happen at some point:

[Link: engadget.com]

What is strange is how they have reported losses of over $121MM total, for the last 3 years.

I think the market they have pwned since 2005 is plateauing to be honest. I mean, what more can you do with music streaming, that they have not done? The timing makes perfect sense for them to cash in and "move on".

If they want to stay relevant, they will need to acquire a content source in the same way that ISPs are buying up studios. Content access only gets you so far. Owning the content and the delivery system is where the real money is at.

Aaaaaaaaand suddenly all those Sonos installs out there seem a little less secure than they did! Holy crap, losing 120+ million over the last 3 years? No one knew except Sonos and they certainly weren't telling anyone... until the investors decided it was time to recover their cash.

Built-in Alexa integration - still fills me with all sorts of 'yuck'.
Look what happens when Spotify moves the goalposts for integration, now look could happen with voice control. Keep things separate peeps!

That’s the first thing I thought of. They are already in bed with Spotify, I’m fairly certain their IPO is to raise the coin to purchase a controlling share in Spotify. I’m sure this has been the plan all along. Makes no sense why everyone but Sonos has to use “connect”

If that IPO is under $20 I'm going to refinance my house and put it all on SONOS.

They're not buying anything, certainly not Spotify.  Sonos has a $1-3B valuation.  Spotify has a $40B valuation.

So, why would SONOS go public?...Not to buy, but to be bought. Who's buying?  One of the Big 3. Amazon, Google, Apple.

Amazon could use it, but only because the speaker is better than their current offering.

Google would want it, but only to stop Apple from buying it..It already works with Alexa, so it's not a great fit.

Apple needs it, their Apple Home sucks and this would give them a boost to get back in the game. The Sonos products are already very "Apple-esque".

All of these companies can buy Sonos with their pocket change...one of them will.  Just like Nest.

WHAT?! 40 b?! That cant be right.

Forbes puts them at $26B

Something seems terribly wrong here. They've lost $120 million over the last three years, right?

That says to me that someone has artificially supported them. Someone wanted really badly for them to be the go-to product. Any competitors who were not prepared to lose the same or more money could not compete. In fact, $120 of loss guarantees no real competition.

When we think we have a free market economy, how is this legal?

These companies will intentionally lose money while they're investing in areas, R&D, etc.  To lose $120M over a 3 year period is not a big deal.

Amazon intentionally showed no profits or kept profits very small for a lot of years.

It's pretty common.

The other thing that you need to think about is, although we've been hearing and using Sonos for nearly a decade, your customers are just starting to ask for it by name in the last couple of years....

I could be totally wrong, I think this is your chance to win the strategic lotto.  You know what SONOS is, you know that nobody has been able to make a "SONOS KILLER" in nearly a decade. (Although they've all tried).

We all know it's a rock solid product whether or not you use it for your business or not.

It's time to break open the piggy bank and watch your money grow..

Even if a company is not losing money year to year, that doesn't mean that they have ever made a real 'profit' if profit means that they have made back what was invested in them to get them where they are, and then started making new money.

I mean Control4, as successful as they are seen to be, would be in that category, right? I don't think they could have made back the $60M or more of private capital they got before they then went public and got a lot more?

I don't think you can compare Control4 to Sonos for a lot of different reasons.  The main being that a customer can buy a piece of Sonos gear at Target and have it connected and playing music in 30 minutes.  Control4 needs and integrator.

Control 4 did $70M in revenue last quarter of 2017..multiply that by 4 and you have $280M.  So, let's call it $300M for the year.

Sonos did more than $1B in revenue last year.

My comment was just addressing the 'artificially supported' comment above. It's not artificial support per se, just that lots of companies, even if they finally make the stage of a year to year profit, may still be many tens or hundreds of millions in actual debt in the form of investment money that they have not remotely recouped. They could have lost millions or actually had billions in gross revenues during that time, but not paid back any of the investment either way.

So, to me, often the term 'profitable' is misleading as it's used. It really translates as not losing even more money. So they don't need to take on yet more debt to keep going. Not that that's not a big milestone of course. But still, it hardly means that they are 'profitable' in the bigger sense in a lot of cases.

Even then, in the tech world, continuing to get folks to pour vast amounts of money that you can't remotely recoup into your company is sort of a strategy, though it's kind of a ponzi scheme in a way. You just have to keep bringing in more investment than you spend, using that to offset year to year loses and to buy other things or fund other projects, until you get enough attention to be purchased by a company big enough that your huge debt isn't an issue.

I have said for a few years now Apple will buy Sonos but you are right, it would be one of the big 3 or even Microsoft

Agree!!