The "textbook" reason an enterprise sells shares to the public is raise more capital as it's entering a mature phase of its business. (Not saying this is why Fa

The "textbook" reason an enterprise sells shares to the public is raise more capital as it's entering a mature phase of its business. (Not saying this is why Facebook is going public, or this is why other companies do it anymore, but this is the logical reason a company goes public.) In that respect, Facebook went "public" privately last year when Goldman invested at $50B valuation. The broader point or context poorly laid out is that businesses don't have to go through the same amount of public hoops that they used to raise the same kind of "public" levels of capital.