Kleiner Perkins has a really good week

Despite the tech industry still stoking the face at Figma’s Hot IPO on Thursday, another important tech IPO came out this week: Ambiq Micro. On Wednesday, the chipmaker for wearable devices rose more than $42 in stocks, up from its initial price of $24 on Friday.

There is one thing that both companies have in common. Kleiner Perkins was a major investor.

So it was a very good week for a venerable venture company. For fun, we calculated the value of Kleiner Perkins stocks to each company.

Kleiner would have sold 1,346,499 shares of Figma at an IPO price of $33, and if Figma had disclosed and the banker exercised the option to NAB additional shares, he could have sold up to 2,756,020 shares at that price. Given the demand exceeds the supply of Figma’s stock, we assume that the banker will snap a full tranche (or already have).

Meanwhile, Kleiner still holds 52,364,374 stakes in Figma, the company said. The stock price goes from around $110 to $142 in the intense trading on the second day, but closed at $115 on the first day, so we use that number.

In Figma: $91 million was returned from the stock sales, with remaining shares being returned with over $6 billion ($33 = $90,948,660, 52,364,374 shares at 115 = $6,021,903,010).

In the viewpoint, this investment in Figma alone is three times more worth the last megafund, which was $2 billion across two vehicles in 2024. Incidentally, Kleiner’s partner who oversaw the investment was Mamoon Hamid, a board member of Figma.

Ambiq was a much smaller company and a much smaller IPO. They sold a total of 4 million shares and raised $96 million at IPO. Existing shareholders will be subject to the classic 180-day lockup before selling. Kleiner holds 2,081,831 stakes, the company disclosed. The shares were still trading at IPO price premiums as of Friday, closing at $43.85 on Thursday. So we use that price.

Ambiq shares: $91.3 million ($43.85 = $91,288,289 at $2,081,831).

But wait! There are more. Kleiner is also having a good month and perhaps a year (Kleiner declined to comment on this story).

The company reportedly took a decent return earlier this month as part of Google’s deal on licensing technology from Windsurf and hired its top talent. I don’t know exactly how many of the $1.1 billion VCs acquired from Windsurf transactions reached Kleiner. However, TechCrunch’s Marina Temkin reports that it is about three times the return of its original funding.

And at least one Kleiner-backed company is waiting for IPOs on the wings. The motivating technology for fleet tracking startups has raised $150 million, led by Kleiner Perkins, and announced this week with Ilya Fushman joining the board. Bloomberg reported in December that it is potentially still ready for an IPO in 2025.