Twitter likely to launch IPO in 2014

Twitter is about to celebrate its seventh year amid speculation that a shake-up of its management ranks before the Christmas holidays might pave the way for an initial public offering as soon as next year.

Based in San Francisco, the world's largest microblogging service is likely to follow the listings of Facebook, Zynga and Groupon, which should help IPO-hungry Wall Street banks and the company's international expansion strategy.

The company is set to open an office in Paris, the seventh outside the United States.

Katie Stanton, vice-president of international market development at Twitter, said: "The next market is France, where we see 150 per cent user growth per year and that's 350 per cent growth in tweets on a daily basis."

According to a report by Greencrest Capital, a research firm that focuses on pre-IPO businesses, Twitter's preparation for its public debut may begin this year and the offering will come next year, given its recent personnel changes.

Greencrest Capital said that Ali Rowghani, the company's chief financial officer, had taken the position of chief operating officer, in the shape-up followed by senior hires from social-game company Zynga and Newsvine, a collaborative news website.

"Twitter is possibly positioning itself for an IPO in 2014, if not sooner. Only time and revenues will tell if the company is headed in the right direction," Greencrest Capital said in a research note.