| Don't want to be that guy but 4-5 years for enterprise startups "to get to this point" which I'm assuming is either that market cap size or IPO is ambitious - Enterprise startups tend to take a while to get that flywheel spinning. The fact that Salesforce did it in 5 years (Founded: 1999, IPO: 2004) means that they are more the anomalie than the others. For example here's a list of Enterprise companies which have taken 7-13 years to get to IPO: Eloqua - Founded: 1999, IPO: 2012. Years to IPO: 13 Qualys - Founded: 1999, IPO: 2012. Years to IPO: 13 Rally Software - Founded: 2001, IPO: 2013. Years to IPO: 12 E2open - Founded: 2000, IPO: 2012. Years to IPO: 12 Exact Target - Founded: 2000, IPO 2012. Years to IPO: 12 Box (Summer IPO) - Founded: 2005, IPO: 2014. Years to IPO: 9 Demandware - Founded: 2004, IPO: 2012. Years to IPO: 8 Fleetmatics - Founded: 2004, IPO: 2012. Years to IPO: 8 ServiceNow - Founded: 2004, IPO: 2012. Years to IPO: 8 Bazaarvoice - Founded: 2005, IPO: 2013. Years to IPO - 7 Workday - Founded: 2005, IPO: 2012. Years to IPO: 7 Marin Software - Founded: 2006, IPO: 2013. Years to IPO: 7 Marketo - Founded: 2006, IPO: 2013. Years to IPO: 7 |