Professional angel investor Mark Lyttleton is the founder and chair of trustees of Percent for Good, a charity established with the mission of enabling professionals to give to high-impact charities by taking donations directly or through payroll giving. As an investor and business mentor, Mr Lyttleton supports companies created to achieve a positive societal impact, including organisations in the carbon sequestration and green energy space.
This article will look at corporate funding and structure and why many companies are opting not to proceed to the IPO stage.
According to a report by Morningstar, private companies are taking longer to go public, with the median age at which a company stages its IPO rising from 6.9 years in 2014 to 10.7 years in 2024. With companies staying private for longer, investors risk missing out on high-growth stage investment opportunities.
There are multiple reasons for this shift, with the main reason being that the evolution of private markets has presented multiple growth opportunities that previously were not available to companies. Historically, one of the principal goals of going public was to raise capital for future growth in addition to creating liquidity for shareholders. Private markets have grown to such an extent over the last 10–15 years that it has become feasible for companies to continue to raise meaningful amounts of new funding without needing to obtain a stock market listing.
In 2020, global private equity assets under management were estimated at $5.2 trillion. By 2024, that figure had risen to a colossal $13 trillion, with experts anticipating that it will hit $20 trillion by 2040.
Alongside significant global private equity assets under management growth, investor appetites and strategies have also evolved, with the secondary trading market for private companies experiencing exponential growth, providing enhanced liquidity opportunities for those seeking to sell. In the first half of 2025, record volumes in excess of $70 billion were reported, somewhat diluting one of the key advantages of going public.
Some of the world’s most powerful companies were created via IPOs, including everything from oil and utilities businesses to food and beverage and tech companies. IPOs provide companies with a game-changing injection of capital to fund day-to-day operations and expansion. However, this immediate influx of capital comes at a price. By opting to stay private, businesses avoid the need to report their trading results to large groups of shareholders, keeping their business plans and finances more private. With public companies required to adhere to complex legal regulations, remaining private avoids the need to disclose potentially sensitive information, along with the need for third-party financial auditing.
Remaining private allows owners to retain more control over the company. Whereas with a public company, shareholders may put pressure on the management team to take the company in a certain direction, staying private allows greater flexibility and control. Rather than succumbing to pressure from a wide range of shareholders with possibly differing agendas, the private business owners have more freedom to pursue their vision. In effect, by issuing shares to investors, public companies dilute ownership, relinquishing some of their control.
Despite a 30% increase in year-on-year IPO listings, in 2026, the IPO market is relatively quiet compared to the last decade. Due to continued market uncertainty and ongoing geopolitical factors, Morgan Stanley predicts that more companies will continue to sit on the sidelines, waiting for more favourable IPO conditions. However, 2026 could be the year of the ‘mega-IPO’, with SpaceX, Chat GPT and Anthropic all considering joining the public markets.
One of the reasons that companies do decide to go public is the pressure to offer employees who own shares liquidity to sell or reduce their holding, although this can also now be done whilst still private. Experts recommend a minimum of 18 months of proactive planning for any major liquidity event, such as an IPO, ensuring they have the right processes, systems and people in place to execute such a significant activity.
