Raspberry Pi staff to share £68m windfall
STAFF at Raspberry Pi are to share a windfall of up to £68m when the micro computer maker floats in London in the coming weeks.
The Cambridge-based company’s employee incentive scheme controls shares amounting to around 13.6pc of Raspberry Pi, according to registration documents filed with the London Stock Exchange last week.
At a £500m valuation this would be worth up to £68m – or an average of £660,000 for each of the company’s 103 employees. The true amount is likely to be diluted by the company issuing new shares as part of the flotation. While the shares do not amount to pure profit, since employees must pay to exercise the share options, the flotation is likely to mean significant windfalls for long-serving staff.
Eben Upton, Raspberry Pi’s founder and chief executive, has shares worth around 2.2pc of the company, according to the documents.
Raspberry Pi last week filed to go public on the London Stock Exchange in what is expected to be one of the biggest tech flotations of recent years.
The company is best known for its tiny computers that have a devoted following of hobbyists and amateur coders, but has a growing business selling to corporate customers for use in industrial facilities.
It is majority owned by the Raspberry Pi Foundation, which supports training for children on computer skills and that is expected to sell down its stake to fund its activities. Other investors include Sony, which manufactures its devices, and the microchip company Arm. Raspberry Pi, which was founded in 2008 and started trading in 2012, has a small team of employees despite growing revenues to $265.8m (£209m) last year. Staff numbers have grown from 85 in 2021 to 103 last year.
Employee shares are separately held but will be converted to ordinary shares when the company goes public in the coming weeks. Some shares are believed to be owned by former employees, although the company prides itself on a low rate of staff turnover. Raspberry Pi’s flotation is a boost to the Government’s efforts to encourage more tech companies to list in London.