Q1 consumer tech multiples
Below are revenue multiples for publicly traded consumer tech companies (B2C). Industries and therefore multiples vary widely.
Social media trades at 5.3x. Multiples rose steadily through 2020 peaking at 22.7x on median in Q1 2021. YOY growth in the space is 10% on median, with Doximity leading the way.
Travel marketplaces down to 1.9x. Multiples hit 10.6x in Q2 2021. Booking.com is trading at 5.7x.
Traditional marketplace multiples vary widely. Prior to Q3 2018, the sector only had 2 companies and now has 10. The median multiple is now 2.3x, but Etsy, Fiverr, Upwork and AirBnB have stronger multiples.
Labor intensive space. The only reason we even include these companies in our analysis is because investors like Softbank insist on labelling these services businesses as tech co’s. At best, they’re tech enabled which isn’t the same thing at all. Remember when Groupon was a high flier? Well today it’s shrinking and trades at 0.3x revenue. Cash on the books represents nearly the entire the market cap. This was one of the fastest growing companies ever that came up during the recession of ’08, and now no one cares. Redfin and Opendoor have been decimated over time. Redfin and Compass don’t make money, which is a very dangerous place to be for services businesses of their size.
Rideshare multiples crushed. Lyft is now 0.8x revenue while Uber is at 2.2x revenue. Keep in mind food delivery saved Uber during 2020 and that line of business is material. Bird seems headed to insolvency.
Subscription. B2C subscription is an excellent business model and trades at 4.2x revenue. Match may be the best business model, with 29% margins and 7% YOYG.
Gaming. The median revenue multiple of 4.7x is strong. SciPlay is a mess while Roblox cratered to 12x from a high of 42x.
Ecommerce is varied. The sector is the least attractive to investors, with a median revenue multiple of 0.6x. There is a big difference between what we would call premium ecommerce like Carvana, Allbirds, Coursera, Chewy, Warby, LegalZoom, and Amazon, versus weak ecommerce like Blue Apron. Note that the margins in ecommerce are terrible with a median EBITDA margin of -5% and YOY growth of only 7%. While we characterize Amazon as ecom, all the value is driven by AWS.
Hardware is down to 1.8x. Roku has fallen the most.
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