Photographer: Qilai Shen / Bloomberg
Photographer: Qilai Shen / Bloomberg
Kuaishou Technology, the main competitor of ByteDance Ltd. in China, Hong Kong is trying to raise as much as $ 5.4 billion in what would be the world’s largest Internet IPO since Uber Technologies Inc.
The short video start, supported by Tencent Holdings Ltd. sells 365 million shares for HK $ 105 to HK $ 115 each, under the terms of the deal obtained by Bloomberg News. The company will begin taking investor orders Monday through January 29 and is scheduled for listing on February 5.
Kuaishou is attempting the world’s largest internet IPO since Uber’s $ 8.1 billion US stock sale in May 2019, according to data collected by Bloomberg. The Chinese start-up’s IPO will also give new impetus to Hong Kong’s already hot capital market and could become Asia’s largest since Budweiser Brewing Co. APAC Ltd. entered the market with $ 5.8 billion almost two years ago.
Kuaishou, which means ‘quick hand’ in Chinese, is one of China’s greatest internet success stories of the past decade and is part of a generation of startups that thrived with the support of Tencent. Along with TikTok parent ByteDance, the outfit created by Su Hua in 2013 pioneered the live streaming and bite-sized video format that has since been taken over by Facebook Inc. all over the world. Kuaishou’s upcoming debut rival, which was last estimated at $ 180 billion.
Kuaishou’s offering has attracted 10 cornerstone investors, who agreed to subscribe for $ 2.45 billion in stock, based on the mid-range traded offering. The line-up includes The Capital Group, Temasek Holdings Pte, GIC Pte, BlackRock Inc. and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, the terms show, previously confirmed Bloomberg News report. The cornerstone investors have agreed to hold shares for six months in exchange for an early, guaranteed allocation.
Kuaishou’s valuation would more than double after the Hong Kong IPO. A top price will value the Chinese company at $ 60.9 billion, up from the $ 28.6 billion raised in a funding round last year, according to Pitchbook. Even at the lower end of the range, Kuaishou will still be valued at $ 55.6 billion.
ByteDance has long been a rumored IPO candidate, but got stuck fighting a US ban on TikTok last year after the video service became a threat to national security. The social media giant was in talks to raise $ 2 billion before listing some of its Hong Kong companies, Bloomberg News reported in November.
According to her, as of September, Kuaishou averaged 262 million daily active users prospectus. That’s still less than half of the 600 million on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok. That said, Kuaishou’s revenues grew 49% in the first nine months of last year to 40.7 billion yuan ($ 6.3 billion), after it boosted money through advertising and e-commerce. While it offers free access to the main platform, the startup is taking some of the tips users give to their favorite live streamers performing viral challenges, lip-syncing the latest pop songs, and playing video games.
Tencent has an approximately 21.6% stake in Kuaishou, and other funders include venture capital firms DCM, DST Global and Sequoia Capital China, the prospectus reveals. Shares in Tencent rose a whopping 6.4% to a record high during Monday’s trading in Hong Kong.
Morgan Stanley, Bank of America Corp. and China Renaissance Holdings Ltd. are joint sponsors of the deal.
– With the help of Dominic Lau and Zheping Huang
(Adds Kuaishou’s appreciation in the sixth paragraph.)