The numbers tell one of the most important stories in B2B right now.
Notion just kicked off an employee share sale at an $11 billion valuation. That’s just 10% above their October 2021 price—after four years.
But here’s what changed: revenue grew ~20x.
That’s the whole story. That’s the playbook. And it’s one every founder who raised at peak-2021 valuations needs to study.
The Journey: From $2M Seed to $11B
In 2021, Notion was trading at 322x ARR. That’s not a typo.
That was peak ZIRP froth—the same era that gave us Figma at 50x+ revenue, Canva at similar multiples, and dozens of other companies that raised at valuations they’d spend years growing into.
Today? 18x ARR.
That’s public company territory. That’s Datadog territory. That’s “we’re actually priced on fundamentals now” territory.
The Two Eras of Notion
Era 1: Hypergrowth Valuation (2019-2021)
From 2019 to 2021, Notion’s valuation jumped 12.5x—from $800M to $10B.
Revenue? It grew 10x—from $3M to $31M.
The valuation was running ahead of the business. Way ahead. At 322x ARR, investors were pricing in a decade of perfect execution.
This wasn’t irrational at the time. Notion had:
- Viral product-led growth that crashed servers
- 80% of users outside the US (massive global TAM)
- A passionate community building templates and tutorials
- Enterprise adoption growing 350% year-over-year
- The “consumerization of enterprise software” narrative in full swing
VCs were fighting to get in. Index Ventures invested $50M at a $2B valuation just 36 hours after Ivan Zhao started looking for funding. Sequoia decided to invest after looking at the numbers for 30 minutes. Pat Grady later said the $10B valuation was “very painful”—but they paid it anyway.
That’s what happens when you have the hottest PLG company in tech and money is free.
Era 2: Revenue Catch-Up (2022-2025)
Then everything changed.
Interest rates went up. Multiples compressed. The 2021 vintage of unicorns suddenly looked very expensive.
But here’s what Notion did: they just kept executing.
- 2022: Revenue more than doubled to $67M
- 2023: Revenue nearly 4x’d to $250M
- 2024: Revenue grew 60% to $400M
- 2025: Revenue grew 50% to $600M
Four years of compounding while the valuation stayed flat.
The multiple went from 322x → 149x → 40x → 25x → 18x.
They didn’t try to raise at a higher valuation. They didn’t do a down round. They just grew into it.
The AI Kicker
In the end, Notion caught the AI wave perfectly. Or at least, it caught the first wave early enough.
They launched Notion AI in November 2022—two weeks before ChatGPT. They were one of the first productivity apps to ship AI features, using GPT-4 and Anthropic’s Claude.
The adoption has been staggering:
- Last year, 10-20% of customers paid for AI add-ons
- Earlier this year, it hit 30-40%
- Now it’s crossed 50%+
When over half your customers are paying for AI features, you do what Notion did: bundle it into Business and Enterprise tiers. That’s how you expand ARPU without raising list prices.
They also just launched AI agents that can perform background tasks—document creation, workflow automation, scheduled actions. The move from “AI assistant” to “AI teammate” is the next leg of growth.
No VCs on The Board, Limited Dilution
There’s a detail in Notion’s story that most founders miss: no VCs sit on their board.
After raising $343M from Sequoia, Index Ventures, Coatue, and others—none of them have board seats. Is that all good? Maybe not. But it is interesting. Founder power to an extreme.
Ivan Zhao added his first outside board member in 2022: a financial auditor (presumably for IPO prep). That’s it.
This is almost unheard of at this scale. How did Zhao pull it off?
- He didn’t need the money. Notion was profitable for years before taking VC. When you don’t need capital, you have leverage.
- He made VCs compete. When Index and Sequoia are fighting over your deal, you can set the terms.
- He kept the team small. Notion had fewer than 10 employees for years while growing to millions of users. Low burn = optionality.
- He owns 30%. Forbes estimates Zhao still owns nearly a third of the company. That’s massive leverage when every VC wants to make him happy.
The result? Zhao can play the long game. No board pressure to sell. No pressure to go public before they’re ready. No pressure to hit quarterly numbers that don’t make sense for the business.
What This Means for the IPO
Notion is likely going public in late 2026. Here’s why the timing makes sense:
The math works now.
At $600M ARR growing ~50%+, they could hit $900M-$1B by the end of 2026. At public SaaS multiples of 15-20x for a company growing that fast, that’s a $15-20B market cap.
That’s a real up-round from the $11B tender. That’s a win for everyone—employees, investors, founders.
The business is mature.
- 100M+ users
- 4M+ paying customers
- 50%+ of Fortune 500 companies using it
- Enterprise sales team scaling (doubling this year, likely doubling again next year)
- AI features driving expansion revenue
- Profitable (they have more cash than the $343M they raised)
The comparisons are favorable.
Monday.com trades at ~10x revenue. Atlassian at ~8x. But both are growing much slower than Notion. A 15-20x multiple for 50%+ growth is defensible.
Notion Isn’t Alone: The 2021 Class That Made It Back To Their Lofty Valuations
Notion isn’t the only company that pulled this off. A handful of 2021-era unicorns have successfully grown into their stretched valuations—and they share a common playbook.
Figma raised at $10B in June 2021 on roughly $200M ARR (50x multiple). Adobe tried to buy them for $20B in 2022, but regulators killed it. Instead of panicking, Figma kept executing: $400M ARR in 2022, $600M in 2023, $749M in 2024. They IPO’d in July 2025 at a $19B fully-diluted valuation—opening at $85 and briefly hitting $47B market cap on their first day. The multiple compressed from 50x to ~17x, but the business 4x’d. Figma is now the gold standard for how 2021 unicorns should go public.
Canva hit a peak $40B valuation in September 2021 on ~$1B ARR. By late 2024, secondary sales valued them at $32B—technically a down round. But revenue had grown to $2.7B. The multiple went from 40x to 12x, and nobody cared because the business tripled. Their August 2025 tender came in at $42B on $3.3B ARR. IPO likely in 2026.
Databricks raised at $38B in August 2021 on $600M ARR (63x multiple). When the market turned, they quietly marked down internally to $31B. But they kept shipping: $1B ARR in 2022, $1.6B in 2023, $3B in 2024, $4B in 2025. Their September 2025 Series K valued them at $100B—a 61% jump from December 2024. At 25x forward revenue with 50%+ growth, investors are paying up again. The difference? Now it’s justified.
Klaviyo raised at $9.5B in May 2021. When they IPO’d in September 2023, they priced at $9.2B—nearly defending their 2021 valuation while the multiple compressed from 35x to 14x. Revenue had grown from ~$270M to $640M ARR. They’re now trading at ~$11B market cap on ~$900M ARR. One of the few 2021 unicorns to go public without a meaningful haircut.
The pattern is clear: the best companies from 2021 didn’t try to defend their multiples—they outgrew them. Valuations stayed flat or even dipped while revenue 3-5x’d. By the time they went public (or are about to), the math finally worked.
The Playbook If You Close a Deal At A Massive Valuation
Here’s what Notion teaches us about growing into a stretched valuation:
#1. Potentially — Don’t Raise Again
Notion’s last funding round was October 2021. Four years without new primary capital.
When you raise again, you either take a down round (painful for morale and optics) or you compound the problem with an even higher valuation you need to grow into.
Notion had the cash to wait. If you raised in 2021, hopefully you do too.
#2. Focus on Revenue, Not Valuation
For four years, Notion’s valuation was basically flat. But revenue grew 19x.
Nobody at Notion was worried about their paper valuation. They were worried about shipping product, closing enterprise deals, and building AI features.
The multiple compression happened automatically. They didn’t have to do anything except execute.
#3. Use Secondary Sales for Liquidity
Instead of raising new rounds (which would require setting a new valuation), Notion did tender offers.
The 2022 tender was at $10B. This 2025 tender is at $11B. Employees and early investors get liquidity without the company raising primary capital at a stretched price.
This is the right move for any company that raised at peak-2021 valuations and doesn’t need the cash.
#4. Catch the Next Wave
Notion could have been a “2021 company”—a pandemic-era collaboration tool that peaked with remote work.
Instead, they caught the AI wave early. They shipped AI features before ChatGPT launched. They’ve now converted 50%+ of customers to paying for AI.
If you raised at 2021 valuations, you need a second act. AI might be it. Or it might be something else. But you can’t just ride the same wave that got you to your peak valuation.
#5. Keep Your Optionality
No VCs on the board. 30% founder ownership. Profitability. More cash than they raised.
Notion has maximum optionality. They can go public when they want, not when they have to. They can say no to acquisition offers. They can take risks on new products.
Every decision Zhao made—small team, delayed fundraising, tough terms with VCs—preserved optionality for this moment.
An Epic Journey Back to … $11 Billion. Back to The Future.
Notion’s $11B tender offer isn’t a down round and it isn’t really an up round. It’s a reset to fundamentals.
At 18x ARR with ~50% growth and AI tailwinds, Notion is priced like a public company. That’s exactly where you want to be before an IPO.
The company grew 19x in four years while the valuation moved 10%. That’s not a failure—that’s the plan working perfectly.
The lesson for every founder who raised at peak-2021 valuations: You don’t fix a stretched multiple by raising at a higher price. You fix it by growing into it.
You let revenue catch up to valuation. You stay patient. You keep executing.
Notion just showed everyone how it’s done.
Sources: Forbes, Bloomberg, CNBC, Sacra. December 15, 2025.
