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CoreWeave, an Nvidia-backed cloud services provider specializing in artificial intelligence technologies, is poised to make its debut on the Nasdaq on March 28, 2025. The company has set the initial public offering (IPO) price at $40 per share, which is below its anticipated price range, resulting in approximately $1.5 billion raised.
This IPO has garnered significant attention from investors across Wall Street and Silicon Valley, marking CoreWeave as the first pure-play AI company to go public and the largest tech IPO in the United States in four years. The broader IPO market has been relatively inactive since late 2021, largely due to challenges such as rising inflation and interest rates that have impacted the tech sector.
As a key supplier to OpenAI, CoreWeave is benefiting from the explosive growth of generative AI following the launch of ChatGPT in late 2022. Microsoft, which provides cloud services to OpenAI, is the largest customer for CoreWeave, accounting for 62% of the company’s revenue of $1.92 billion last year.
CoreWeave offers access to a vast array of Nvidia graphics processing units (GPUs) to major tech firms and AI companies, including Meta, IBM, and Cohere. However, CoreWeave faces stiff competition from leading cloud service providers like Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Oracle.
Despite a significant increase in revenue—up 737% year-over-year—CoreWeave reported a net loss of $863 million last year, highlighting the capital-intensive nature of its business, which requires substantial investment in data centers and GPU rentals. To date, the company has raised nearly $13 billion in debt, primarily to fund GPU acquisitions for its leased facilities in the U.S. and internationally.
Initially aiming for a price target between $47 and $55, the company adjusted its offering in response to cautious sentiment from investors. “There’s a lot of headwinds in the macro,” remarked CoreWeave CEO Michael Intrator during a CNBC interview. “And we definitely had to scale or rightsize the transaction for where the buying interest was.”
The tech IPO landscape has been sparse over the last few years, with only 13 venture-backed technology IPOs recorded in 2022, 2023, and 2024 combined, compared to a peak of 77 in 2021, according to data from Jay Ritter, an emeritus finance professor at the University of Florida.
CoreWeave’s IPO is notable as it is the largest in the U.S. since the $1.57 billion debut of UiPath, an automation software company, on the New York Stock Exchange in 2021. Following CoreWeave’s SEC filing on March 3, several companies, including Hinge Health, Klarna, and StubHub, have taken steps towards their own IPOs. Additionally, popular chat software provider Discord is reportedly working with investment banks on its potential IPO, as reported by Bloomberg.
Should CoreWeave’s stock perform well post-IPO, it may pave the way for a series of additional AI-focused companies to enter the public markets. Mark Klein, CEO of investment firm SuRo Capital, noted the potential for an “AI parade” following this landmark event.
Data analytics firm Databricks recently announced a funding round valuing the company at $62 billion, while OpenAI is nearing a funding round that could value it at $260 billion. CoreWeave, established in 2017 and headquartered in Livingston, New Jersey, employed 881 individuals by the end of 2024. Prior to this IPO, Intrator held 38% of CoreWeave’s voting power, while Nvidia’s ownership amounted to 1%, alongside investments from firms like Fidelity and Magnetar.
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