The Multi-Billion Dollar B2B Software Squeeze: Analyzing Bending Spoons’ Acquisition Spree of Airtable and Miro

The enterprise software landscape has experienced a seismic shift with the rapid-fire consolidation of two of its most iconic brands. Milan-based tech rollup Bending Spoons has officially announced a definitive agreement to acquire visual collaboration giant Miro at an enterprise value of $1.355 billion. This transaction follows closely on the heels of Bending Spoons’ acquisition of Airtable for an enterprise value of $1.285 billion, an agreement announced just five weeks prior and finalized on an accelerated timeline. Together, these back-to-back deals represent the absorption of two premier Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) titans of the last decade by a single European consolidator, signaling a new era of capital efficiency and valuation realism in the venture-backed tech ecosystem.

The scale of these transactions highlights a profound realization within the mature B2B software market: achieving profitability and securing multi-million-dollar cash reserves, once considered the ultimate insurance policies for venture-backed startups, offer limited defense against market compression when organic growth rates flatten. Both Airtable and Miro entered these acquisition talks from positions of exceptional financial strength. They possessed years of operational runway, had successfully navigated the turbulent post-pandemic market corrections, and boasted massive, loyal enterprise customer bases. Yet, both companies ultimately priced at modest multiples of under three times their Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR).

To understand the mechanics of these landmark transactions requires examining the underlying balance sheets. When Bending Spoons negotiated these acquisitions, a staggering fraction of the headline purchase prices consisted of the target companies’ own accumulated cash reserves. In the case of Airtable, approximately $965 million of its $2.25 billion equity value was simply cash sitting in its bank account, leaving an enterprise value of $1.285 billion. Similarly, Miro held roughly $435 million in net cash against an equity value of approximately $1.79 billion, bringing its enterprise value to $1.355 billion.

In corporate acquisitions, acquirers pay the enterprise value and effectively hand back the target’s cash at face value, which accounts for a 1.0x multiple. Consequently, the actual operating businesses of Airtable and Miro were valued at remarkably restrained multiples: roughly 2.7x ARR for Airtable and 2.3x ARR for Miro. For companies operating in the current macroeconomic climate with moderate single-to-double-digit growth rates, these multiples align closely with public market comparables for cash-flow-generative software assets. The enormous cash stockpiles accumulated during the zero-interest-rate policy era did not command a premium; rather, they merely insulated the companies from immediate distress while failing to compound into higher valuation multiples.

A Closer Look at the Financial Metrics and Growth Trajectories

The disclosures surrounding the two acquisitions provide a fascinating window into the diverging growth profiles of mature SaaS leaders. Bending Spoons’ public communications regarding Airtable indicated that the company’s ARR was expanding at a year-over-year rate exceeding 20%, reaching approximately $480 million as of June 2026. Conversely, the public announcements regarding Miro emphasized absolute scale rather than velocity. Miro reported an ARR of approximately $600 million—with nearly 90% derived from business and enterprise accounts—alongside a paying user base of nearly 4 million and more than 750 enterprise customers generating over $100,000 annually. However, the release notably omitted a specific year-over-year growth rate.

Independent market intelligence firms, such as Sacra, previously estimated Miro’s revenue at roughly $420 million in 2022, implying that the intervening four-year period saw growth moderate to the high single digits annually. Miro’s underlying metrics reveal a business built on massive top-of-funnel reach—boasting approximately 100 million total registered users—paired with a 4% conversion rate to paid tiers. This translates to an average revenue of roughly $150 per paying user annually. Despite the differences in growth disclosure, both deals cleared within a tight margin of 40 basis points on valuation multiples, underscoring that institutional buyers in 2026 price mature B2B software fundamentally on verified growth velocity rather than historical brand prestige.

Capital Allocation Strategies and the Limits of the Balance Sheet

The histories of Airtable and Miro illustrate contrasting approaches to capital allocation and operational discipline. Miro famously achieved profitability as early as 2020, prior to securing a massive $400 million Series C funding round at a $17.5 billion valuation in January 2022. Over its fourteen-year operating history, Miro raised a cumulative total of $476 million, maintaining rigorous financial controls that kept the company consistently profitable, even through subsequent workforce reductions, including 119 layoffs in February 2023 and approximately 275 positions cut in late 2024. Public estimates place Miro’s total headcount between 1,400 and 1,900 employees prior to the Bending Spoons acquisition.

In contrast, Airtable pursued a more aggressive, capital-intensive growth strategy, raising approximately $1.4 billion in venture capital. Under the leadership of CEO Howie Liu, Airtable underwent a dramatic "refounding" in June 2025 aimed at embedding artificial intelligence natively across its product architecture. This strategic pivot included the launch of conversational interfaces like Omni, execution layers like Field Agents, the acquisition of AI startup DeepSky in October 2025, and the introduction of standalone AI products like Superagent in January 2026. Despite these ambitious engineering efforts and wartime leadership execution, Airtable’s growth rate stabilized near 20% on $480 million of ARR. The comprehensive AI overhaul fortified the company’s competitive moat and preserved its cash position, but it did not alter the fundamental valuation multiple assigned by the market.

The contrasting paths of Miro and Airtable demonstrate that capital efficiency and fortress balance sheets, while essential for survival, do not automatically compound into superior enterprise valuations in a market hyper-focused on hyper-growth. Both companies possessed the ultimate luxury in venture capital: "default alive" status with years of financial runway. This runway enabled them to dictate the timing of their exits and execute complex product transformations without facing immediate insolvency. Yet, neither balance sheet could summon competing strategic bidders from tech conglomerates like Microsoft, Salesforce, or Atlassian. In the current market environment, well-capitalized B2B software companies growing at moderate rates face a concentrated buyer universe consisting primarily of operational rollup specialists rather than strategic entities willing to pay control premiums for unproven technological roadmaps.

Structural Nuances and Deal Terms: The Role of Equity Rollovers

A notable distinction between the two transactions lies in their financing structures. While the Airtable acquisition was executed entirely in cash, the Miro transaction incorporated a significant equity rollover component. Certain existing Miro shareholders agreed to reinvest approximately $295 million of their cash proceeds into newly issued equity of Bending Spoons, representing roughly 16% of Miro’s total equity value.

This structural difference sheds light on Bending Spoons’ corporate finance strategy. Following its July initial public offering, which raised $1.68 billion, and robust operating cash flows—reporting $291 million in net cash from operating activities for full-year 2025 and $76 million in the first quarter of 2026—Bending Spoons remains exceptionally active in the M&A market. However, with a combined enterprise value of over $2.6 billion for Airtable and Miro alone, deploying purely cash-based consideration requires careful capital management. By securing a $295 million equity rollover from Miro stakeholders, Bending Spoons optimized its liquidity while aligning key legacy shareholders with the long-term performance of the consolidated entity.

For Miro, an exceptionally strong seller with positive net cash and no external pressure to sell, accepting partial payment in buyer paper illustrates the pragmatic realities of late-stage tech M&A. Acquisition pricing is ultimately dictated by the liquidity capacity of active buyers in a given quarter and the willingness of sellers to embrace flexible deal structures to achieve closure.

Post-Acquisition Integration and the Human Capital Impact

While the financial figures dominate headlines, the human capital implications of these rollups warrant careful scrutiny. Bending Spoons has established a distinct operational playbook focused on post-acquisition efficiency, technology modernization, and AI integration. According to the company’s SEC filings, Bending Spoons recorded $78.6 million in reorganization-related expenses in 2025 alone, following significant corporate integrations involving acquisitions such as AOL, Eventbrite, and Vimeo properties. Public disclosures indicate that out of approximately 1,830 acquired employees from those transactions, only a few hundred retained their roles by the end of 2026.

Company leadership has been transparent regarding this operational model. CEO Luca Ferrari has publicly noted that approximately 90% of Bending Spoons’ codebase is now generated or assisted by artificial intelligence, while Chief Revenue Officer Matteo Danieli has highlighted that customer retention rates remain remarkably stable throughout these transitions. Bending Spoons has systematically identified over 1,000 potential acquisition targets globally, positioning itself as a permanent consolidator of mature digital assets.

For the thousands of employees currently operating within Miro and the remaining teams at Airtable, these acquisitions present a dual reality. On one hand, vested equity instruments convert into substantial liquidity events based on valuations of $1.79 billion and $2.25 billion, delivering meaningful financial returns to rank-and-file employees who received grants during earlier growth phases. On the other hand, historical precedent suggests that corporate restructuring and headcount rationalization will follow within the first twelve months post-closing. While a robust corporate balance sheet grants startup founders and executives the autonomy to select their acquisition partners and timing, it confers no operational control over the acquired products or workforce once the transaction is finalized.

Broader Implications for the B2B SaaS Ecosystem

The dual acquisitions of Airtable and Miro by Bending Spoons serve as a masterclass in modern software economics, offering several vital lessons for growth-stage technology founders navigating the post-zero-interest-rate environment.

First, achieving cash-flow positivity and securing "default alive" status must be viewed as foundational operational milestones rather than ultimate destinations. In a market where venture capital dedicated to enterprise software flows disproportionately to AI-native startups demonstrating triple-digit growth, companies expanding at 20% year-over-year cannot rely on securing subsequent funding rounds at inflated valuations.

Second, capital must be deployed aggressively to accelerate growth velocities rather than accumulated defensively. A dollar retained as cash on a balance sheet yields a 1x return upon exit, whereas a dollar of ARR scaling at high double-digit growth rates commands significantly higher multiples. Founders sitting on massive cash reserves must treat capital deployment as an active strategic decision, accepting the calculated risks of bold product expansion or strategic M&A rather than preserving capital for an elusive market window.

Ultimately, the consolidation of Airtable and Miro underscores an immutable rule of enterprise software: valuation multiples are governed by growth trajectory, not historical cash reserves or brand legacy. As the technology sector continues to mature, operational discipline and artificial intelligence integration will define the survivors, while strategic rollups will increasingly absorb the pioneers of the previous decade.