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Dropbox beat Wall Street estimates in its first earnings report since its IPO

The company has had to battle persistent criticism that it was overvalued.

Dropbox CEO Drew Houston and co-founder Arash Ferdowsi stand behind a Nasdaq podium at their IPO.
Dropbox CEO Drew Houston and co-founder Arash Ferdowsi stand behind a Nasdaq podium at their IPO.
Dropbox CEO Drew Houston, left, and Dropbox co-founder Arash Ferdowsi
Drew Angerer / Getty

Dropbox beat Wall Street’s expectations for its first quarter as a public company, another sign of momentum after one of 2018’s marquee IPOs.

The file-storage company said it had collected about $316 million in revenue in the most recent quarter, a 28 percent rise over last year. The Street was looking for about $309 million in sales. The company also reported 11.5 million paying users, versus an estimate of 11.1 million estimated by RBC analyst Mark Mahaney.

Companies typically take pains to ensure that their first quarter after going public is strong, so Dropbox’s small overperformance isn’t terribly surprising. But the company, which has had to battle persistent criticism that it was overvalued, continues in its opening months to be valued solidly on the public market at $12.8 billion.

“We didn’t need to go public to raise money,” CEO Drew Houston said on a conference call. “We’ll use the proceeds to continue investing in growth and the product portfolio.”

Dropbox executives said on the call that the company expected to see about $330 million in revenue in the upcoming quarter and about $1.35 billion total in 2018 — both of which beat analysts’ expectations.

The company still loses money, booking an operating loss of over $466 million in the period, largely due to stock-based compensation.

Shares were flat in after-hours trading.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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