The Leaked Financial Numbers Of 6 High-Flying Unicorn Companies

Many of today’s unicorn companies are staying private longer than in the past, which means they’re putting off the day when their finances and operations are subjected to the scrutiny of public markets.

Observers are referring to the rise of mega-rounds and late-stage financing as the “private IPO” trend. However, more and more often we’re seeing financials for these high-flying startups reach the general public via leaks.

Below we’ve compiled the major leaks around unicorns’ financials from the past year. We’ll continue to update this list with new glimpses into unicorns’ financials.

Buzzfeed

Source: Gawker

**BuzzFeed Leaked Financials**
Year	Revenue ($M)	Net Profit ($M)
2011	$4.1	-$3.3
2012	$20.3	-$4.0
2013	$64.1	$7.0
1H 2014	$46.2	$2.8
Source: Gawker

Notes:

BuzzFeed’s editorial budget increased dramatically from just $858k in full-year 2011 to $10.45M for the first half of 2014.

Lyft

Source: Bloomberg

**Lyft Leaked Financials**
	Revenue($M)	Net Profit ($M)
1H 2015	$46.70	-$127
Q3 2015	$26.30	-$124
Source: Bloomberg

Notes

$96.1M was spent on marketing in 1H 2015.
Lyft originally projected net revenue of $25M and a loss of $14M for July 2015, however they ended up missing revenue projections by ~33% and lost ~2.5x more than forecasted for the month.