IoT data collector Samsara’s IPO will be fun to watch – TechCrunch

Happy Friday! The TechCrunch crew is still in a modest period of repose thanks to the Thanksgiving holiday, but we wanted you to have numbers to chew on all the same. So, this morning, we’re taking a brief look at Samsara’s IPO filing.

The Exchange explores startups, markets and money.

Read it every morning on TechCrunch+ or get The Exchange newsletter every Saturday.

You may have heard of Samsara. Founded in 2015, it’s raised more than $900 million during its life as a private company, per Crunchbase data, including a simply massive $700 million round in 2020 that valued Samsara at $5.4 billion.

Big bucks for a young company, yes, but does it have the results to back them up?

We’ll find out. But first, we have to talk about what Samsara actually does. And for that, we have to start with a phrase that you haven’t read as much about lately: IoT.

What does Samsara do?

If you are new to a company, reading its IPO filing is always good fun. You get to play a very diverting game — Can the Company Actually Explain What It Does? Most companies cannot.

It seems, in many cases, that after seventy-eleven rounds of edits between lawyers, bankers, comms staff, PR pros and executives, how most companies talk about themselves when they go public has been reduced to a lukewarm stew of corporate gibberish.

Thankfully, this is not the case with Samsara. Its business is actually pretty easy to understand.