Vodafone Group announced on Tuesday that its floating infrastructure subsidiary Vantage Towers will aim to raise up to $3.32 billion in proceeds in Europe’s biggest initial public offering of 2021.
The price range for Vantage Towers’ IPO on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange was set by the UK-based operator at 22.50 to 29 euros per share, suggesting a total market capitalization of up to 14.7 billion euros.
That would be higher than the valuations of this year’s crop of European IPOs, which include Polish e-commerce firm In Post, German used-car trading platform AUTO1, and British footwear brand Dr. Martens. According to Refinitiv data, the IPO will be the largest European telecoms IPO since Belgacom in 2014 and Germany’s largest since Knorr Bremse in 2018, both of which raised $4.4 billion.
According to Vodafone, the base bid size is 2 billion euros, but through an “upsize” option and an over-allotment option for lead, it can be increased to 2.8 billion euros. According to a bookrunner, the free float on the base offer size will be 19.1 percent, increasing to 24.6 percent if the increased offer is placed. Vodafone also reported that Digital Colony, an infrastructure investor and operator, and RRJ, a Singapore-based global equity fund, had agreed to be cornerstone investors, buying 950 million euros in stock.
The offer period will end on or around March 17th, and trading will begin the following day. The deal’s global coordinators and bookrunners are Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, and UBS. Joint bookrunners are Barclays, Berenberg, BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, and Jefferies.
