GoPro goes public
The following story was updated after GoPro raised $427 million in its IPO, and its price jumped 30 percent in the first day of trading, closing above $31 per share.
GoPro, which makes action sports cameras, has gone public. The company raised $427 million in its initial public offering, initially selling shares at $24 apiece.
Investors bought the stock based on GoPro’s potential. So what are they buying?
GoPro videos are famous for scenes of daredevil skiing or surfing. So far, GoPro has made most of its money from cameras, which can be mounted on helmets, toddlers, birds — you name it.
But, to really make money, GoPro needs to be more interactive; perhaps build its cameras into goggles that connect to the Web.
“I might want a map of the resort. I might want to know where I am in the resort, ” says Andrew Sheehy of Generator Research.
GoPro videos could also have a future on cable TV.
“If they are able to take a ‘best of’ and upstream it — you know, they get their own half-hour show on MTV or something,” says Jeff Howe, who teaches multimedia journalism at Northeastern University.
GoPro could sell advertising, leading to a steady stream of revenue, which investors would love.
Why is GoPro so popular? Check out some of the craziest, death-defying, fascinating, and hilarious GoPro videos on the web.
1. Watch what happens when this GoPro camera falls out of a plane. You won’t believe the end.
2. Daredevil Felix Baumgartner inspired the world when he became the first man to jump from 24 miles above the surface of the Earth. See what he saw through the GoPro attached to his head.
3. GoPros aren’t just for taping freefalls from great heights. Here’s what happens when you put one on a ukulele and give that ukulele to an orangutan.
4. People use GoPros to go places they couldn’t otherwise go — like right up to a rattlesnake. We don’t suggest you try this one at home.
5. There’s a reason GoPro is so popular with extreme atheletes…
6. GoPro was first popular with surfers.
7. But you hardly need to be an athelete or daredevil to use one.
8. This guy took his to Burning Man.
9. Ever wonder what it must be like to be a rat crawling around in Walmart?
10. Or go to space?
11. Or live inside The Matrix?
12. Of course, who says you have to do anything interesting at all?
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