Pivotal Software Inc. has filed the preliminary documents for an initial public offering, with a placeholder target of $100m.

Pivotal was originally launched as a joint venture between EMC and its subsidiary VMware, with additional investment from General Atomic. The company offers a wide variety of products including cloud–based development platforms, analytics software, project management and automation tools.

Progress

Pivotal Labs office in London
Pivotal Labs office in London – Pivotal

During the 2018 fiscal year ending in February, Pivotal reported revenue of $509.4 million, up from $416.3m last year, and $280.9m the year before. And even a net loss of $163.5m was a marked improvement on last year’s $232.9m loss, and the $282.7m it shed the year before.

This year, for the first time, Cloud Foundry subscriptions made up a larger portion of the company’s revenue than services did. Subscriptions earned it $250m for the fiscal year, from only 300 customers. In its filing, the company reported that subscriptions are expected to make up an increasing part of its revenue over time.

An IPO will allow Cloud Foundry to improve its financial flexibility, it states, with the money earmarked for working capital, investments, and potential acquisitions.

Whereas the company will offer Class A shares to investors, Class B stock will remain exclusive to Dell and VMware.

Meanwhile, Dell Technologies is considering a number of ways in which to address its mounting levels of debt, including an IPO of its own and a reverse takeover by VMware.