Dr. Martens’ Shareholders Raise $1.8 Billion in London IPO
Dr. Martens Plc owner Permira Holdings and other shareholders raised 1.3 billion pounds ($1.8 billion) through the British bootmaker’s initial public offering, London’s largest domestic listing since September.
The sale of 350 million existing shares priced at 370 pence apiece, the top end of an initial range, the company said in astatement Friday. The new stock will make its debut Friday in London, with about 35% of the company’s shares available for trading.
The IPO values Dr. Martens at 3.7 billion pounds, which is more than 10 times the300 million pounds Permira paid for the bootmaker in 2014. Dr. Martens’ is the largest IPO in London by a U.K. company since online shopping emporiumTHG Plc raised 1.88 billion pounds ($2.4 billion) in September, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
The Griggs family, which sold Dr. Martens to Permira, and employees and directors of the company also offered shares in the IPO. They can sell another 53 million shares if there’s enough demand, which would increase the size of the offering to 1.49 billion pounds.
Several other IPO candidates are taking advantage of a lockdown-fueled online shopping boom. Poland’sInPost SA, which operates automated parcel lockers, soared in its Amsterdam trading debut Wednesday, while virtual greeting-card companyMoonpig Group Plc and used-car platformAuto1 Group SE are taking investor orders for public offerings.
The pandemic has accelerated the shift from brick-and-mortar stores to online portals, with physical stores increasingly forced to close down due to reduced footfall. Dr. Martens’ e-commerce platform brought in nearly a fifth of its revenue in the year ending March 2020, up from just 7% in 2015.
The company had secured cornerstone investments of 250 million pounds from BlackRock Inc., 100 million pounds from Janus Henderson Group Plc and 75 million pounds from Merian Global Investors.
The deal gathered enough investor interest to cover all the shares on offer within about an hour of opening its order book. Dr. Martens accelerated the IPO timeline, closing its offering two days earlier than originally planned.
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. andMorgan Stanley are joint global coordinators, while Barclays Plc,BofA Securities, HSBC Holdings Plc and Royal Bank of Canada will be joint bookrunners in the event the offer proceeds.Lazard & Co. is the company’s financial adviser.
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