Bending Spoons to buy collaboration tools maker Miro for $1.36B, 90% less than its 2022 valuation
Italian acquirer Bending Spoons is buying collaboration platform Miro for $1.36 billion in cash (an equity value of $1.79 billion), a steep fall from the $17.5 billion valuation Miro held in late 2021. The deal reflects a dramatic re-pricing of many high-growth SaaS companies since the pandemic-driven boom.
Why It Matters
The transaction highlights how 2021-era private-market valuations have compressed and how buyers like Bending Spoons are snapping up established software businesses at a fraction of their peak prices. That trend could reshape exit options for other mature but slower-growing SaaS firms.
Key Facts
- Acquirer: Bending Spoons
- Target: Miro
- Purchase price (cash): $1.36 billion
- Equity value: $1.79 billion
- Late-2021 valuation: $17.5 billion
Bending Spoons has agreed to acquire online collaboration startup Miro for $1.36 billion in cash, which the buyer says corresponds to an equity value of $1.79 billion. That price marks a roughly 92% decline from the $17.5 billion valuation Miro commanded in late 2021.
Miro began in 2011 under the name RealtimeBoard and gained wide adoption during the COVID-19 pandemic as companies shifted to remote work and sought digital whiteboarding tools. The company expanded its platform to integrate with more than 250 apps and forged partnerships with firms including Atlassian, Cisco, Microsoft and Zoom. Miro now markets itself as an “AI innovation workspace,” offering AI assistants, workflow and prototyping tools, and connectors that surface context from services like GitHub, Jira and Slack.
By 2022 Miro had grown from roughly 5 million to about 30 million users over two years; today it reports more than 4 million paying users and 100 million total users. Bending Spoons said Miro generates about $600 million in annual recurring revenue, with 90% of that coming from business and enterprise customers. The company also holds roughly $435 million in net cash and is profitable. Miro’s headcount and cost-cutting moves have shifted since 2022 — when it had about 1,200 employees — including layoffs that cut 119 roles in February 2023 and a reported reduction of 275 positions in October 2024.
The deal underscores how software-as-a-service valuations have contracted since the pandemic peak, as companies reassess spending and favor bundled suites or better-funded rivals such as Canva, Figma and Microsoft. Bending Spoons has recently acquired other once-highly valued startups as well: the buyer purchased Airtable for $1.28 billion last month. Observers note it is notable that Miro’s board and investors agreed to sell at this level despite the company’s cash position and profitability, a sign of how exit expectations for mature SaaS businesses have moved since 2021.
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