Language-learning company Duolingo closes at 36% in Nasdaq debut

Language-learning company Duolingo’s shares closed up 36% in its market debut on Nasdaq on Wednesday. Shares of the company closed at $139.01 ensuring a market capitalization of nearly $5 billion.

Duolingo goes public under the ticket symbol “DUOL.”

The company’s 3.7 million shares were prices at $102 apiece on Tuesday, which was higher than the initial range of $85 to $95.

Duolingo said it posted 129% revenue growth last year to $161.7 million and brought in $55.4 million in revenue for the quarter ended March 31, which is an increase of 97% from last year.

The language-learning company offers 95 courses across 40 distinct languages including Spanish, French and Italian, to endangered languages like Hawaiian, Navajo and Scottish Gaelic.

The company which is primarily dependent on distribution through mobile app stores claims 40 million monthly active users and more than 500 million downloads.

Duolingo said that in 2020 it gained 51% of its revenue from Apple’s App Store while 19% from Google Play Store.

“If you live in the United States you may not know about this, but worldwide billions of dollars are spent by people having to take tests to prove that they know English,” co-founder and CEO Luis von Ahn said, reported CNBC.

“During the pandemic we got a lot of institutions accepting our tests,” he added, claiming that 17 of the top 20 universities, including Stanford, accept Duolingo’s online test as proof of English proficiency for international students.

(With inputs from CNBC)

Picture Credits: CNBC