Deciding to go public

The headline: On July 18th we announced our IPO on the NYSE, and became the first Latin American software company listed in the US. It sounds simple, but it took years of hard work, focus, and discipline to make this possible. Every decision we made, every new hire, process, and strategy, was designed to make Globant a truly global company. Finally “ringing the bell” at the NYSE is one more step on the road to building a world-class organization. It has been a long and complex process going public, but it is not simply an objective in and of itself. Instead it is a tool, like many others we employ, necessary to enhancing a global and successful company. To those of you out there who dream as big as we do, let me share some of my experiences on building a world-class organization.

• “THE” Decision

It all started the day we founded Globant. We were 4 friends in a bar, all with the same dream. We wanted to build a long-term company that thought big and challenged the status quo. Very few companies in Latin America dreamed so big at the time. We choose to follow a different path. Historically in our region, the predominant way to start a company is as a “Lifestyle Business.” These are small to midsize companies designed to benefit their owners’s lifestyle, and typically create very little impact within their industry and community. We wanted to change the industry and improve our community by creating new opportunities for our people. From day one, we thought about Globant not as a mere company, but as a transformative community.

• Setting our Mind for the Future

This simple decision to dream big, if well executed, sets the tone for all following decisions. As your company starts to grow, you will find one of two ways to provide solutions. Either you choose short-term answers with temporary solutions or you create robust improvements that will benefit everyone in the long run. And yes, it is harder, and sometimes not as cost effective, but ultimately it is the only choice if you wish to go in the right direction. You choose to invest in having the best people, the best technology, and the best processes. Overtime, this will allow you to scale, and keep on growing even faster in the future.

Thinking big will determine the way your company has to perform and make decisions. Especially considering your team: You need to bring the best people to work with you, not only the best professionals, but also for those who share your dreams and will work with you to make them happen.

All these decisions, if done on the time, will lead to a sustainable and growing company, which is the first step to making your big dream come true.

Ultimately, the decision will never be whether you want an IPO or not. The decision is always about the vision you have for your company.

• Working Towards the IPO

One more step to creating a world-class organization is to aspire to lead. Whether in the marketplace or a within a specific segment of the world, the key is to have access to the best possible tools that allow you to take advantage of your company’s abilities. The best talent, the best systems, the best customers, the best partners, and of course, the best possible financing tools required to achieve your goals.

In our case, we decided that an IPO would add a lot of value in many different aspects of the company. Things like access to efficient financing, and currency for future acquisitions were important to us. We also wanted our company to be in step with world-class standards.

Once you decide that the IPO will be the instrument to help you achieve your goals, you have a huge new challenge in front of you. If you were already thinking long-term, you know that you will have plenty of challenges ahead. You will need to look again at your internal processes, your quality assurance system, customer relations, operations, marketing, finance, and more. Everything has to be conceived and developed for a public company, way before actually becoming one. You must be transparent and expect everyone in your company to behave the same way. You have to be predictable in your numbers and provide an attractive environment for your team since they are the ones who will help make these dreams happen. You must align every message you broadcast to both internal and external audiences. Finally, you have to do all these things without losing your focus. As time goes by, you must pay even more attention to the business and help make it grow.

But there’s more. After all that, you need to be aligned with the bankers running your IPO, and with lawyers, investors, management, and the Security Exchange commision. All these other groups play a part in finally giving you the green light to begin your roadshow, which comes just before the final IPO price and it is central in the process. During this roadshow, you will tell investors about your story, and your company. If they like what they hear, they will buy your shares and you can do an IPO. If they don’t, the road gets a lot tougher.

Despite all the hard work required, I would summarize it as a very exciting process overall. But even more exciting is what comes after. I think back to that July 18th and how we lived through it. You might think we felt a deep sense of fulfillment, and that we were relaxed and enjoying this milestone. And for a couple of days, we were. But after that short period of enjoying a well deserved stop, we were back building our dream. Globant’s IPO is already a reality, and now we have even more plans than before. We are even more enthusiastic about our future!

We always thought of the IPO as just one more step towards our goal of becoming the best company in the creation of innovative software products, bringing opportunities to where the talent is. We always knew that once we achieved that milestone, more roads would open in front of us. Now, we keep dreaming even bigger and we want to encourage others to follow. We might have been the first to do this in our region, but there is a lot of burgeoning talent in Latin America. It is exciting to wait for the future and for those that will surprise us next.