Bigcommerce CEO discusses potential plans to list on Nasdaq

One of Sydney’s leading start-ups, e-commerce platform Bigcommerce, has confirmed it will be leaving Australia to exit by listing on the tech-dominated Nasdaq market in the next two years.

Founders Eddie Machaalani and Mitch Harper are passionate advocates for building and running world-leading businesses from Australia since launching the company in 2010.

This commitment to stay within the Sydney start-up community has meant they spend “appalling amounts of time on planes” and pay particular attention to who they hire and their commitment to the company culture.

Their three rounds of external capital investment, totaling $US75 million ($A83m), have all come from US venture capital firms, the first two rounds from General Catalyst and the third from Revolution Ventures.

Harper told StartupSmart while they personally plan to stay in Australia for as long as possible, they will be looking to list the business soon.

“Investors expect exits. Whether that’s a sale or a listing, when you take investment that’s part of the package,” Harper says. “We haven’t locked anything in yet, but we will be looking to list on the Nasdaq in the next 18 to 24 months.”

Harper and Machaalani currently serve as co-chief executives. Harper says becoming a public company could require one or both of them to move on from the company or remain with the company and move to the US.

The company recently launched a new product and passed over $3 billion worth of transactions processed through the site.

It employs over 300 people, just over 100 here and with a slightly larger team in Austin, Texas. The company is a US entity with an Australian subsidiary.

Putting Sydney on the start-up map as the home of what could soon become a billion dollar business has always been a goal for these co-founders.

“We wanted to build this from Sydney and exit it while we live here,” Harper says. “We want to put a big gold star on this city and show the new guys coming through we can build global businesses from here.”

Bigcommerce recently passed $3 billion in transactions processed through the site and launched a new product.

In February, they shared their scariest moment so far with StartupSmart, and how they overcame their fear of raising capital and becoming a big business too quickly.

This article first appeared on StartupSmart.