Yelp has enlisted the help of Goldman Sachs Group and Citigroup as it prepares to go public.
According to Bloomberg, the San Francisco-based company doesn’t yet know how many shares will be initially offered, but the two megabanks will likely be leading the effort.
The Wall Street Journal was the first outlet to catch wind of the IPO, reporting the offering may give the company a value of approximately $2 billion.
Yelp is shrinking its venture in the daily-deals sector in preparation for its IPO.
The company apparently wants to establish its own brand and move away from daily deals because the market has become crowded.
As such, Yelp plans on cutting half of its Deals sales staff, and will shift 15 workers to other areas of the business.
Yelp’s IPO preparations come just weeks after Groupon raised $700 million in an initial public offering. That makes it the biggest IPO by a US Internet company since Google cashed in way back when.
It will be interesting to see how much more influence a $2 billion IPO will give Yelp in the restaurant industry. One Harvard Business School researcher believes Yelp is already responsible for shifting consumer spending away from big chain eateries and elevating the independently owned restaurant.
Online consumer reviews from Yelp are starting to substitute for more traditional forms of reviews in the restaurant business. How many other ways can Yelp monetize consumer reviews?
