Proposed merger between Purple and Global Partner Acquisition Corp has Purple valued at $1.1 billion.
Utah has gained notoriety in the last few years as breeding ground for great business, boosted by the unicorn status (companies worth north of $1 billion) of homegrown enterprises like Domo, Pluralsight, InsideSales, and Qualtrics.
Purple is another business rooted in Utah — founded by Tony and Terry Pearce in Alpine, expanded into a massive facility in Grantsville — that relies on tech and science to sell comfort products like mattresses, pillows, and cushions. They’ve recently been featured in prominent outlets like Forbes and TechCrunch, with each outlet examining the question of how long before Purple joins the list of Utah-based unicorns.
The answer: any day now. Purple has signed a tentative merger deal with New York-based Global Partner Acquisition Corp that values Purple at $1.1 billion and would result in them becoming a publicly traded company. Tony and Terry would retain a majority share in the combined company, with current Purple CEO Sam Bernards continuing in the same capacity.
Paul Zepf, CEO of GPAC, said very nice things in a statement:
I believe Purple is a tremendous merger partner for GPAC, given its powerful brand and highly differentiated portfolio of comfort technology solutions. The company’s revolutionary products, vertically integrated design and manufacturing expertise, and world-class marketing capabilities ideally position the company to disrupt multiple massive industries that are ripe for innovation. We are also very excited by Purple’s financial model that
displays a unique combination of growth, scale, and profitability. We are pleased to partner with Terry, Tony and Sam and look forward to their continued leadership of Purple.
