As of earlier this year, a series of contract wins had quintupled the share price of WANdisco (WAND) in just over 12 months. Its multiples had become more akin to technology stocks in the US than those in London. The market valued it at £906mn.
The name is short for Wide-Area Network Distributed Computing, which is exactly what it does. It can move enormous amounts of data from different centres into the cloud, to be analysed with AI (especially machine learning). This can help create services that could transform businesses, particularly in telecoms and car manufacturers. In a 5G world, demand could be massive. The company was making losses rather than profits but appeared to be that rare thing: a UK growth tech stock with an edge over the market.
As sales soared, momentum investors piled in. On 6 March this year, the ever-enthusiastic David Richards (chairman, president and chief executive) was predicting that he’d sign up every power generator in Europe. In moving live data, “we have 100 per cent market share”, he was reported as saying. “Ten enterprise sales guys pulled in $127mn in bookings. We think we can get a billion dollars of bookings with 20 salespeople, and be the most profitable company the world has ever seen.” A US listing beckoned.