NEW YORK (AP) — The owner of AOL and other tech businesses hit Wall Street with a $1.7 billion initial public offering Wednesday.Bending Spoons priced 58 million shares at $29 apiece. The company is getting $1 billion in proceeds, while the rest is going to shareholders. The stock surged 41% shortly after it started trading under the symbol “BSP” on the Nasdaq, giving it a market value of $25.5 billion.Among the company’s well-known holdings are the event creation and ticketing company Eventbrite, and the video hosting service Vimeo. AOL, formerly America Online, is a more recent acquisition for the company. The email and search engine service dates back to the dawn of the internet age.AOL itself went public in 1992 and was a vanguard of technology and communication. It reached a market value of $164 billion in 2000 shortly before merging with Time Warner. It then crashed along with the rest of the industry following the bursting of the dot-com bubble. It has been bought and sold several times over the last two decades.
Bending Spoons’ key focus is acquiring troubled tech companies and overhauling them. The company takes its name from the fictional concept of bending spoons with the mind, as portrayed in the dystopian AI-focused “The Matrix” films. The company’s founders say the name is meant to evoke focus and dedication, as well as some humor.
