I got home from the financial printer’s offices in San Francisco around 3 a.m. on Aug. 18, 1993. We stayed late to finish the registration statement for filing that day with the Securities and Exchange Commission, to begin the IPO of shares in Level One Communications Inc.

We were racing to make a self-imposed deadline to complete the offering by September. We had gone from a first meeting with investment bankers to being ready for the offering in less than 60 days — record speed for an initial public offering. That morning, the investment bankers called from New York at 6 a.m. to say we needed to change the registration statement again. Could I get right in to the office to make the changes? Since the offering was going so well, the company would be able to raise an extra couple million dollars by raising the price per share.

Level One, the Sacramento-based manufacturer of communications semiconductor chips, initially expected to sell shares at $13 to $15 per share. The IPO price was $17 per share, but the first day’s trading took the price to $25.

Level One was valued at just under $200 million the day it went public in 1993. It sold to Intel six years later for $2.2 billion. Level One had 85 employees when it went public, and 10 times that number when it was sold.

Level One’s IPO 10 years ago, and the company’s subsequent success, were high points for technology business in the Sacramento region. Now that the late 1990s technology business bubble has burst, the IPO market is still slumbering, and startup companies still struggle for venture capital, what can Sacramento-area companies learn from Level One’s experience?

Five conclusions: First, there is no substitute for a rapidly growing market.

At the time of the IPO, Al Gore’s reference to the Internet as the “electronic superhighway” had not yet become a cliché and parody phrase — most people had no idea what the Internet was. The penetration of the Internet into home and office was still in the future. At the time, penetration of the personal computer into the home was still the major technology business story, with - prices for an entry-level machine containing the most current technology running at about $2,000.

Level One sold products that connected telephone and computer networks, and went public as that business began an extraordinary expansion.

• There is no substitute for perseverance.

Level One was started to develop parts for IBM’s telephone products division. When IBM sold that division, midway through the project, Level One had to pick a new business plan and a new direction. Along the way, the company received venture-capital investment, then more venture capital, then (when the economy dipped in early ‘90s) a “down round” financing like so many current startups have experienced that all but wiped out the early venture-capital investors.

As the company developed customers, it received financial backing from strategic partners, and some more venture capital, before becoming an “overnight” IPO success eight years after it started.

• There is no substitute for mission-focused and talented employees.

Dr. Robert Pepper was the CEO of the company through its lean years and up to the time it was acquired. He had a strong core team, and a capable board of directors that provided solid assistance and direction. With so many engineers, the company culture was oriented toward problem solving, a culture that valued success over office politics.

The rapidly rising market for Internet-related products lifted all players during the 1990s, but Level One beat established companies that offered competing products, such as National Semiconductor and AMD, in the marketplace.

• The bubble was a bubble.

Level One had established customers and established products when it conducted its IPO, and was able to use the money it raised to expand business based on what the company had already done.

By contrast, many of the Internet stocks that went public in the late 1990s threw lots of money at markets that hadn’t developed, and in many cases, never did develop.

Having revenue as a qualification for doing an IPO meant Level One had real experience in real markets and could deploy capital raised from public shareholders intelligently.

Tech headquarters are different: Finally, it is hard for an economically developing region like Sacramento to establish and keep headquarters companies.

Large headquarters companies can become the leading employers, patrons of the arts and public services, and drivers of regional economic growth. The salaries of executive and senior staff contribute to the local economy and have an economic multiplier effect. A substantial portion of employee wealth — such as that created through stock options — stays in the area.

However, in dynamic industries such as semiconductors and technology, a locally based headquarters company will likely start out as a player in a particular niche, rather than as the creator of an entirely new industry.

Niche companies — even $2.2 billion niche companies — often are purchased by larger competitors who are rounding out their own product offerings. The company then is no longer a headquarters, but becomes a division of the larger parent company.