Executive Overview
As venture-backed startups choose to remain private for much longer cycles, the secondary market for trading pre-IPO shares has evolved into a vital, highly competitive financial ecosystem. Once viewed as an informal or niche option for disgruntled employees looking for early liquidity, the secondary market now dictates the real-time health, sentiment, and valuations of the world’s most sought-after private technology companies.
At the center of this structural shift is EquityZen, a New York-based marketplace founded in 2013 to bridge the gap between private companies, early shareholders, and eager investors. Following its acquisition by global banking giant Morgan Stanley—announced in October 2025 and completed in January 2026—EquityZen operates under an institutional umbrella that highlights just how mainstream the pre-IPO asset class has become.
To understand the broader implications of these trends, Crunchbase News spoke with Phil Haslett, co-founder and chief strategy officer of EquityZen. In an extensive interview, Haslett provided a masterclass on the current private-market dynamics: why artificial intelligence companies are commanding steep premiums while legacy SaaS startups trade at deep discounts, how hard tech is reshaping investment portfolios, what the IPO pipeline looks like beyond headline-grabbing monoliths like SpaceX, and why corporate-approved liquidity programs are transforming talent retention.
This article dives deep into Haslett’s insights, examining the mechanics of secondary markets, the bifurcation of startup vintages, and the institutional consolidation currently reshaping the venture capital landscape.
Detailed Chronology: The Evolution of EquityZen and Secondary Markets
To contextualize the current state of private-market trading, it is necessary to trace the trajectory of EquityZen and the broader secondary ecosystem over the past decade.
2013–2020: The Niche Beginnings
When EquityZen launched in 2013, the concept of buying and selling shares in private companies before an initial public offering (IPO) or acquisition was largely restricted to elite institutional venture funds, family offices, and high-net-worth insiders. Startups typically went public within four to six years of founding. Consequently, secondary markets were viewed as secondary remedies for illiquidity rather than strategic tools for managing cap tables. Over the rest of the decade, however, the "staying private longer" phenomenon took root. Companies like Uber, Airbnb, and Palantir delayed public debuts for a decade or more, creating massive internal pools of employee stock options and restricted stock units (RSUs) that demanded liquidity solutions.
2021–2024: The Go-Go Years and Market Whiplash
The macroeconomic environment shifted dramatically during the pandemic-era boom of 2021. Capital was abundant, private valuations soared to unsustainable heights, and secondary trading volume spiked. However, the subsequent market correction in 2022 and 2023 left thousands of startups stranded at over-inflated valuations from their 2021 funding rounds. This valuation disconnect created a massive wave of secondary transactions. Companies that were not ready to face the public markets—or take a painful "down round" on their primary cap tables—increasingly turned to structured secondary programs and tender offers to provide employees with liquidity without altering their headline primary valuation.
October 2025 – January 2026: Institutional Consolidation
The maturation of the secondary market culminated in a wave of major financial consolidation toward the end of 2025. In October 2025, Wall Street titan Morgan Stanley announced its intention to acquire EquityZen, a transaction finalized in January 2026. This followed concurrent moves in the sector, such as Charles Schwab’s acquisition of Forge Global. These landmark deals underscored a definitive truth: secondary liquidity is no longer a peripheral venture market accessory; it is a core offering demanded by institutional wealth managers, retail accredited investors, and corporate human resources departments alike.
Supporting Context & Metrics: The Great Private-Market Bifurcation
The private markets are currently defined by a striking dichotomy: a deep discount landscape for older, legacy technology companies sitting alongside aggressive premiums for cutting-edge artificial intelligence and hard-tech infrastructure firms.
The 38% Discount Reality Versus AI Premiums
Data compiled across secondary platforms reveals that the average private transaction recently occurred at roughly a 38% discount to the company’s last primary funding round. For many observers, this discount might signal systemic mispricing or distress. However, Haslett pushes back against that characterization, explaining that the market is dealing with two entirely distinct "vintages" of private companies.
- The 2021 Vintage (Legacy SaaS): Companies founded or heavily financed during the peak years of 2021 often raised capital at staggering valuations based on traditional Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) growth metrics. Many of these businesses were not built "AI-first." As enterprise buyers pivot their IT budgets toward AI solutions, these legacy SaaS companies have had to scramble to adapt. Their growth rates have frequently slowed from triple digits to modest figures (e.g., 20%), leading secondary investors to value them at substantial discounts relative to their peak primary marks. A prime example cited by Haslett is Airtable, which previously raised capital at a valuation exceeding $10 billion before recently transacting at a significantly reduced valuation.
- The AI-First Vanguard: Conversely, companies established in 2023 and beyond benefit from clean slates. Built with an AI-first mentality from day one, they scale rapidly—often sprinting from zero to hundreds of millions in revenue in a matter of years. Secondary investors are willing to pay premiums for these assets because their trajectories are clear, and the likelihood of a rapid valuation markup in subsequent rounds remains high.
The Rise of Hard Tech, Robotics, and Space Infrastructure
Beyond pure software and AI applications, secondary trading data highlights a structural shift toward capital-intensive hard tech. Companies entering secondary Top 20 lists—such as Figure AI (robotics), Redwood Materials (battery recycling), Scale AI, and specialized defense and space tech firms—point to a broader thematic bet by investors.
While these enterprises require massive upfront capital expenditures (like building factories or clearing complex regulatory hurdles) and take longer to achieve predictable revenues than traditional SaaS companies, investors are willing to underwrite them. The massive success and public market momentum of Elon Musk’s SpaceX have opened the floodgates, proving that generational wealth and societal impact lie in physical infrastructure, space tech, and national security tech. Furthermore, unlike past decades when hardware startups had no alternative to dilutive equity financing, today’s founders can leverage expanded credit markets and asset-based financing options.
Official Statements and Expert Analysis: Insights from Phil Haslett
The dialogue with Phil Haslett sheds light on the nuanced realities of navigating pre-IPO shares, evaluating corporate health, and forecasting public market receptivity.
Navigating the Post-SpaceX IPO Pipeline
When asked whether the broader IPO market is truly open beyond blockbuster offerings like SpaceX, Haslett offers a measured assessment:
"Generally, I’d say it’s better than it was three or six months ago. If you were a private late-stage technology company, you probably were going to wait until after SpaceX anyway, so that hurdle is gone. Tech markets are also doing well. The stock market is at an all-time high, and there’s been a strong recovery in tech stocks overall. I assume that we’re gearing up for a busier summer than usual."
However, Haslett warns that post-IPO performance for typical tech startups has been lukewarm at best. Companies like Cerebras saw initial market enthusiasm followed by a cooling-off period. Consequently, while the window to go public is open, boards and executives must weigh the realities of public market scrutiny against remaining private.
Primary Valuations Versus Secondary Truths
One of the most profound insights shared by Haslett concerns the fundamental difference between a primary funding round and a secondary market trade:
"A primary valuation is a point-in-time measure of what investors were willing to pay, and those investors generally received preferred stock with additional rights and liquidation preferences. The secondary market is more telling of what you could actually get in your pocket now. For companies that embrace secondary liquidity, those prices help employees, former employees, and early investors understand what their shares are actually worth."
This distinction is crucial. While primary rounds often reflect optimistic narrative-driven valuations protected by downside liquidation preferences, secondary transactions represent the unvarnished, clearinghouse price established by matching willing buyers and sellers on an open marketplace.
The Imperative of Management Execution
As artificial intelligence reshapes enterprise software, concerns have occasionally surfaced that foundation model providers (such as Anthropic or OpenAI) will release turnkey legal, cybersecurity, or productivity tools that instantly obliterate standalone SaaS businesses. Haslett views these concerns as largely overstated panic, emphasizing that ultimate survival boils down to management execution:
"It’s about a company’s ability to take a legacy SaaS business and turn it into something AI-enabled across the business. Are you using AI tools to improve internal tasks? Are you building AI into your product for clients? Companies that can combine the stickiness and customer loyalty they’ve already built with their domain expertise and AI are going to do just fine. The ones that are slower to adopt are going to get pummeled."
Haslett points to enterprise mainstays like SAP, Oracle, and Salesforce as proof that deeply ingrained software platforms can successfully adapt if their leadership acts decisively and keeps improving their product offerings to give enterprise clients a compelling reason not to switch.
Future Outlook: The Maturation of Private-Market Liquidity
As the dust settles on the wave of consolidation that brought platforms like EquityZen under Morgan Stanley and Forge Global under Charles Schwab, the future of private-market liquidity points toward normalization and institutionalization.
The Normalization of Company-Approved Tender Offers
Historically, companies viewed secondary liquidity programs with skepticism, fearing that allowing employees to sell shares signaled a lack of long-term commitment. Today, that stigma has largely vanished. Driven by fierce competition for top-tier engineering, product, and AI talent, forward-thinking founders are proactively establishing company-approved secondary programs and regular tender offers.
By offering periodic liquidity windows, private companies can retain key personnel who might otherwise feel compelled to jump ship simply to realize financial gains from their equity compensation. This trend is further supported by an abundance of institutional capital eager to secure direct ownership in high-performing private companies before they ever reach public exchanges.
What Lies Ahead for Investors and Founders
Looking forward, the boundary between public and private markets will continue to blur. Financial institutions will likely introduce increasingly sophisticated financial products, structured funds, and wealth management tools designed to give accredited—and potentially retail—investors fractional exposure to pre-IPO giants.
For startup founders, the mandate is clear: capital efficiency, rapid AI integration, and proactive cap table management are no longer optional. As secondary markets mature into transparent, highly liquid barometers of corporate health, the market will continue to ruthlessly reward genuine execution while punishing complacency.
In this new era, platforms like EquityZen—backed by the balance sheets and global reach of institutions like Morgan Stanley—will play a defining role in shaping how capital is allocated, how talent is rewarded, and how the next generation of technological innovation is financed.
