Case Study
Published on Sep 2025
In December 2024, ServiceTitan - the SaaS platform powering trades like HVAC, plumbing, and electrical services - went public in one of the most notable software IPOs of the year. Shares priced at $71 and closed the first day at $101, giving the company an initial market cap of $8.9B.
For the employees who built ServiceTitan, this IPO was more than a headline. It was the moment years of hard work, late nights, and tough decisions turned into tangible value.
This is the story of four former ServiceTitan employees who chose to use Equitybee funding to exercise their stock options ahead of the IPO - and share in the success of the company they helped build.
Like most startup employees, ServiceTitan team members were granted stock options. But to become shareholders, they needed to pay to exercise those options. Between strike price and taxes, this cost often reaches six figures.
The average U.S. employee needs ~$140,000 to exercise and pay taxes on their options
Equitybee data
More than 55% of employees lose their equity leaving their stock options unexercised and expired
Carta data
Between May 2020 and October 2024, Equitybee facilitated funding for four ServiceTitan employees.
This funding allowed them to:
✔ Exercise their vested options with no out-of-pocket costs
✔ Become shareholders before the IPO
✔ Share the upside when ServiceTitan went public
Just a few months after the last offer was funded, ServiceTitan IPO’d - unlocking liquidity.
Employees who used Equitybee were able to exercise their stock options without draining savings or taking on debt. With Equitybee, employees get the funding they need to cover exercise and tax costs - while retaining ownership of their shares.
In return for the funding, once or if a liquidity event (such as an IPO or acquisition) occurs, the employees agree to:
These terms are defined up front and only apply if the company exits. If there's no liquidity event, the employee owes nothing.
Terms vary based on strike price, market conditions, and investor demand. Stronger opportunities (low strike, strong company outlook) often result in more favorable terms.
Each of the ServiceTitan employee offers came with individualized terms - including exercise amount, investor share percentage, and accruing interest - based on:
1 Their option strike price
2 The company share value at time of offer
3 Time horizon until expected exit
This tailored approach ensured every participant had funding terms suited to their situation.
Equitybee has now helped 2,750+ startup employees from 850+ pre-IPO companies - including Reddit, Stripe, SpaceX, Databricks, and ServiceTitan - exercise their stock options and capture their upside. With over $247M facilitated, our mission is simple:
No loans
No out-of-pocket cost
No giving up your equity
Your information is secure and confidential
