Pinterest

Pinterest, Inc. operates a visual discovery service in which users save images and links, called Pins, to themed collections called boards, and increasingly use the product as a visual search engine for recipes, home, fashion and shopping ideas. The company was incorporated in Delaware in October 2008 as Cold Brew Labs Inc. and renamed Pinterest, Inc. in April 2012. It grew out of Tote, a shopping catalog app built by Ben Silbermann and Paul Sciarra; Evan Sharp is the third co-founder. Development of Pinterest began in December 2009 and a closed beta launched in March 2010. The company is headquartered in San Francisco. Bill Ready, previously an online commerce executive, became chief executive in June 2022, when Silbermann moved to executive chairman. Revenue comes almost entirely from advertising, which began with Promoted Pins in 2013.

Before its IPO the company issued eleven series of redeemable convertible preferred stock, from Seed 1 and Seed 2 through Series H, carrying an aggregate liquidation preference of about $1.47 billion according to the prospectus. Bessemer Venture Partners, through partner Jeremy Levine, has been on the board since April 2011 and designated the director elected by the Series A-1 and A-2 holders. Andreessen Horowitz designated the Series B director, general partner Jeffrey Jordan, who joined in October 2011. FirstMark was an early backer through FirstMark Capital I and later funds. Fidelity funds and Valiant Capital came in as later-stage holders. Before the offering, Bessemer entities held 13.1% of shares, FirstMark entities 9.8%, Andreessen Horowitz entities 9.6%, Fidelity entities 7.1% and Valiant entities 6.0%.

Pinterest went public on April 18, 2019 at $19 per share, listing on the New York Stock Exchange under PINS, selling 75 million Class A shares for gross proceeds of $1.425 billion. Shares closed the first day at $24.40. The Wall Street Journal had put the company's value at $12 billion when it filed confidentially. At the time of the IPO it reported more than 250 million monthly active users and 2018 revenue of $755.9 million. Its annual report for 2025 shows revenue of $4.22 billion, up from $3.65 billion in 2024, net income of $416.9 million and 619 million monthly active users. In January 2026 the company cut about 15% of its workforce.

Pinterest shows the long arc of a consumer internet company that monetized late. Bessemer partnered with the company in 2011, roughly a year after the closed beta and before any advertising product existed, and held its position for about eight years until the 2019 listing. The early funds, Bessemer, FirstMark and Andreessen Horowitz, together owned close to a third of the company going into the IPO, a stake built through seed and Series A and B rounds that were small relative to the later growth rounds. The record also shows how a dual-class structure preserved founder voting control through more than a billion dollars of preferred financing.