InstaCart employees fulfill orders for deliveryPatrick T. Fallon | Bloomberg | Getty ImagesTech investors last week finally heard utterance of their favorite three-letter acronym: IPO.It’s been 20 months since a notable venture-backed tech company went public in the U.S., and the chatter in Silicon Valley has centered around who will break the ice. On Friday, grocery delivery startup Instacart and data and marketing automation company Klaviyo filed for stock market debuts.Earlier in the week, chip designer Arm, which is owned by Japan’s SoftBank, said it plans to hit the Nasdaq seven years after being taken private in a $32 billion acquisition.The three companies have very little in common, but collectively they represent a test of the excitement level among public market investors for new opportunities. Depending on how they perform out of the gate, their offerings could propel others to follow in the fourth quarter.”Other teams will watch the reception of these and it could encourage some of those management teams to stop waiting around for yesteryear and just get it done,” said Lise Buyer, founder of IPO consultancy Class V Group.By “yesteryear,” Buyer is referring to the kinds of valuations tech companies were achieving in 2020 and 2021, which were record years for tech IPOs. Software vendor Snowflake, which debuted in late 2020 and saw its price-to-sales multiple shoot up to about 50, now trades at under 17 times revenue. Food delivery company DoorDash has seen its stock drop by more than two-thirds since its high in 2021, even though revenue has since grown by over 60%.”We aren’t going back to 2021 anytime soon,” Buyer said.Instacart, backed at high prices by venture firms including Sequoia and Andreessen Horowitz, has ha …
