Getty ImagesOura has pulled its plan to sell shares in its business on the US stock market, in a move which would have valued the firm at $15bn (£11.3bn), just days after announcing it.
The maker of smart rings which track their owners’ health said it would postpone its flotation “due to uncertainty in the Initial Public Offering (IPO) market” and did not say when it might go ahead.
Oura had filed official documents setting out plans to raise up to $2.2bn by offering shares in the business to investors just over a week ago.
The tech firm has become the latest business to delay its public listing, with experts saying the IPO market is getting more challenging.
Earlier this month, US nuclear technology firm Holtec International also postponed its flotation. It blamed an “unusual confluence of developments that has impaired investor confidence in the market for new public offerings”.
In particular, it cited rising energy costs, military conflicts, global trade tensions and concerns about inflation which have led to central banks including the US Federal Reserve raising benchmark interest rates.
This week, the yield – or interest rate – on US debt repayable in 10 years’ time hit the highest level since 2007.
Samuel Kerr, global head of equity capital markets at Mergermarket, said: “What is now clear is we are in a very different IPO market to the one we envisaged just a few weeks ago.”
Oura had planned to sell shares priced at between $40 and $44 on the Nasdaq stock market index, giving the company an implied market value of $15bn.
In its last full financial year, ending 30 September 2025, Oura made a pre-tax profit of $23.5m on sales $907.8m. That compares to a $6.2m pre-tax profit in the previous year.
Its most recent figures for the nine months to 30 June this year show pre-tax income of $70m on sales of $1.2bn.
Oura, founded in Finland in 2013, has its global headquarters in San Francisco and makes smart rings – costing upwards of $300 – which monitor things such as its owner’s heartbeat and sleep patterns which are analysed and presented on an app.
The company is the subject of a class action lawsuit which accused it of false advertising by claiming its rings can accurately track a person’s sleep activity and patterns.
The lawsuit, filed by the Clarkson Law Firm in August, claimed: “Oura rings cannot measure one’s sleep or cycles. That’s because sleep happens in the brain, not on one’s finger.”
It is understood that Oura’s decision to delay an IPO is not connected to the lawsuit.
In a statement, a spokesperson for Oura said: “We stand behind our science, research and accuracy claims.”
They added: “Like other consumer sleep wearables, Oura Ring estimates sleep stages using multiple physiological signals, including heart rate, heart rate variability, movement, breathing patterns, and temperature.”
