Boxabl Plots Going Public Via SPAC at $3.5B Valuation

Modular housing startup Boxabl is taking the side door to Wall Street.

The Las Vegas-based firm plans to go public at a $3.5 billion valuation through a merger with FG Merger II Corp., a special purpose acquisition company, according to a recent filing reported by Bisnow. The move will land Boxabl on the Nasdaq under the ticker “BXBL.”

SPACs, or blank-check firms, boomed during the pandemic but have since fallen out of favor amid increased regulatory oversight and underwhelming post-merger stock performance. They are often seen as a shortcut to public markets that avoids the rigorous scrutiny of traditional IPOs.

Per the merger terms, Boxabl’s private shareholders will roll their equity into public stock, with 350 million shares issued at $10 each. Co-founders and co-CEOs Paolo and Galiano Tiramani will stay at the helm.

While no firm date has been set, the SPAC has the right to walk away if it’s not finalized by year’s end.

Boxabl builds modular units in a factory and ships them to sites, marketing them primarily as accessory dwelling units. The firm, founded in 2017, says it’s raised $230 million from more than 50,000 investors, receiving a major boost in 2023 when Elon Musk said he lived in one of its homes.

The company plans to use the public listing to fund expansion, with Galiano Tiramani citing its potential to “deliver affordable, sustainable housing at scale.”

But Boxabl isn’t without baggage. The firm was the subject of a 2023 SEC investigation into its securities marketing tactics. The probe closed last July with no enforcement action and details were never made public.

Meanwhile, a former employee, Yanni Tassev, was charged by the SEC last year with allegedly defrauding investors out of $1.6 million by selling fake Boxabl shares. That case is still in court.

In the immediate aftermath of the pandemic, the SPAC market was all the rage, especially for investors seeking out new opportunities in the technology sector. But the performance of the SPACs left much to be desired and cooled down the market.

— Holden Walter-Warner