Source: Golden Ten Data
Author: Guo Jia
According to documents submitted on Tuesday,$SOFTBANK GROUP CO (SFTBY.US)$Subsidiary chip design company$Arm Holdings (ARM.US)$The IPO valuation on the NASDAQ could be as high as $52 billion.
SoftBank will issue 95.5 million American Depositary Shares with a target price of 47 to 51 US dollars per share, accounting for about 10% of the total number of issued shares. The company plans to raise up to $4.87 billion, which will also be the biggest US IPO this year. According to the Wall Street Journal, people familiar with the matter said,They expect strong pre-IPO demand may drive up stock prices.
Electric vehicle startups since the end of 2021$Rivian Automotive (RIVN.US)$Since going public, no other company has reached this scale when it debuted on the public market.
The British company designs chips for most smartphones around the world, and was listed in London and New York before being bought by SoftBank for $32 billion in 2016.Last month, SoftBank bought 25% of its shares worth $64 billion from its managed Vision Fund.The IPO valuation is slightly below that figure.
Documents show that after listing, SoftBank will retain control over about 90% of Arm's shares. The final pricing and its IPO on the NASDAQ exchange are scheduled to take place next week. The stock code is “ARM”.
First-tier tech giants want to join
Arm's IPO investor list includes some of the world's best-known technology companies, who are preparing to raise a total of $735 million in shares in the IPO. According to the documents submitted on Tuesday,$Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (SSNLF.US)$,$Alphabet-A (GOOGL.US)$/$Alphabet-C (GOOG.US)$,$Apple (AAPL.US)$,$NVIDIA (NVDA.US)$with$Intel (INTC.US)$They are all likely to participate as “cornerstone investors.”
Other top investors include$Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM.US)$with$Advanced Micro Devices (AMD.US)$, and other chip brands MediaTek,$Cadence Design Systems (CDNS.US)$with$Synopsys (SNPS.US)$.
The interest of large companies shows thatWall Street and industry leaders have high hopes for the rapidly budding artificial intelligence market.The market helped chip giant Nvidia reach trillion dollars in market capitalization this year and fueled tech stocks to soar amid a wave of enthusiasm for emerging technologies.
The lead underwriters of the Arm IPO include$Goldman Sachs (GS.US)$,$Barclays (BCS.US)$,$JPMorgan (JPM.US)$with$Mizuho Financial (MFG.US)$.
Is the spring of IPOs here?
This major IPO may mark a turning point in the relatively calm IPO market since 2022.Arm could help pave the way for other tech companies and startups whose IPO plans stalled during the economic downturn.
According to Bloomberg data, the US IPO market has reached its lowest point since 2009, and since March of last year, the number of companies listed on domestic exchanges in the US has reached a record low.
Rob Wotczak, CEO of investment bank Freedom Capital Markets, said in an interview:
“The IPO market is arguably the slowest in 20 years. Investors are hungry for new ideas, and venture capital firms have become impatient. The increasing number of calls we are receiving and the due diligence we are currently undertaking attests to this.”
For SoftBank, the IPO gives it an opportunity to gradually sell its shares in ARM, and any early impetus from this stock offering could provide new funding for separate investments in emerging artificial intelligence companies. According to The Information,More than 60% of the startups invested by venture capital firm Y Combinator are artificial intelligence companies.This shows that the market is showing a great deal of interest in this area.
Additionally, if Arm's deal succeeds, it could generate profits for SoftBank founder Sun Zhengyi to cushion the $30 billion loss of its Vision Fund last year.
Wotczak said, “We know a lot of companies have been on the sidelines, and we expect Instacart to test the market later this month. Other well-known companies such as Stripe and DataBricks will also be watching closely.Therefore, we believe that ARM's successful exit from the IPO market will prove market potential to these waiters.”
editor/tolk