Twitter on Thursday unveiled plans to pump up the globally popular one-to-many messaging service with a $1 billion stock market debut.
The initial public offering (IPO) is expected to be the most sought-after since Facebook in May 2012, a listing that faced numerous glitches on the Nasdaq and which saw the company's share price slump before recovering this year.
Twitter outlined its plans in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, providing the first public insights into the San Francisco company that has rocketed to Internet stardom since its launch in 2006.
In the regulatory filing, Twitter disclosed that it had 218 million active users as of June 30 in a 44 percent increase from the same point a year earlier. It reported that it lost almost $80 million on nearly $317 million in revenue in 2012.
Twitter brought in $253.6 million in revenue in the first half of this year, but remained in the red with a loss of about $69 million, the company said in the filing.
Some noted that Twitter would be close to breaking even this year if it hadn't spent slightly more than $67 million on social television analytics firm BlueFin Labs.
Forrester analyst Zachary Reiss-Davis sees the capital-raising move by Twitter as a sign the company is intent on improving ways people enjoy content on its platform and how marketers connect with users.
Twitter did not give a date for the IPO but said it would take place as "soon as practicable."
The company, which allows users to share messages of up to 140 characters, said its mission is to "give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly without barriers," the IPO document said.
It users range from celebrities and professional news agencies to individuals with thoughts to share.
Twitter reported that about 500 million Tweets are fired off daily.