IPO Duds

[crimsonghost747]

(11-21-2020, 11:59 AM)vbin Wrote:

(11-21-2020, 03:46 AM)crimsonghost747 Wrote: I never really liked the idea of investing in IPOs. It's risky since you don't really have all the necessary information yet.
And like most of us here, I'm in this for decades so I tend to favor the more stable companies since a proper DGI portfolio WILL get me where I want to be eventually. Sure, it would be faster if I could find some IPOs that pop 1000% in a week.

But I have invested in HYLN and U.
HYLN because I believe they have a good concept and a CEO who can make it into reality. Competition is going to be fierce but I think they have a shot. I have quite a large position, some (or all) of which I will sell on the way up. (if that is the direction it goes to)

U because it's essentially a duopoly when it comes to gaming. Plus all the other potential uses for U. This I plan to keep for a long time.

What's the other company with U in duopoly? I have heard that before. I am not into gaming. But I can see the way world is going, gaming is going to get bigger and better. Stadia( Google's cloud gaming platform just sent me a $100 worth controllers for free t promote their platform. Tried it, good business model they have).

U makes gaming engine the way I understand, why valuation is so high? Just hype or they have an advantage?

Indeed, the main product of U is the unity game engine.
While there are many game engines around, it's pretty much a choice between Unity and Unreal Engine (by Epic games) for everyone who is not a big independent studio with millions of dollars of funding. These two have all the features you need and attractive pricing models which allow you to basically start your project without paying anything for the engine. (the developer starts paying when they start earning revenue)

The moat here is massive. Developing a game engine is an extremely time and resource consuming effort. We are talking several years of work by a full sized development team... at a minimum. Most (or all?) of the other fancy game engines apart from Unity and Unreal are ones that the big studios have developed for themselves and are keeping for their own use. 

That is for the game engine part. Of course there are other uses for Unity too but I don't really understand the advantages/competition on that side. I'm in this since I view Unity & UE having essentially a duopoly in game engines and as such they will both benefit significantly from the money that is flowing into the gaming sector as a whole.

There is most likely quite a bit of hype in the price but that seems to be the default for any tech stock in this market. I'm horrible when it comes to estimating any sort of value for companies like this, they are high growth and currently not profitable. So I really can't say if the valuation is crazy or not, I just like their business plan.