GlobalFoundries Inc and major shareholder Mubadala Investment Co raised almost US$2.6 billion in an initial public offering (IPO), pricing the chipmaker’s shares at the top of a marketed range.
The company and Mubadala on Wednesday sold 55 million shares for US$47 each after marketing them for US$42 to US$47, according to a statement confirming an earlier report by Bloomberg News.
At US$47 a share, GlobalFoundries has a market value of more than US$25 billion based on the outstanding shares listed in its filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
Photo: Bloomberg
The listing is the third biggest on a US exchange this year, topped only by South Korean e-commerce firm Coupang Inc’s US$4.55 billion IPO and Chinese ride-hailing company DiDi Global Inc’s (滴滴) US$4.44 billion raise, data compiled by Bloomberg showed. That does not include blank-check and similar companies.
GlobalFoundries is appealing to public-market investors as interest in the semiconductor industry hits an all-time high.
Shortages caused by a surge in demand for electronics during COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns and insufficient supply have made chip factories more valuable to the economy.
For the first half of the year, GlobalFoundries had a net loss of US$301 million on revenue of about US$3 billion, compared with a loss of US$534 million on US$2.7 billion in revenue a year earlier, according to the filings.
Contract chipmakers such as GlobalFoundries fabricate chips for large technology companies such as Apple Inc and Amazon.com Inc. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and Samsung Electronics Co dominate the market, and Intel Corp has ambitions to become a bigger force in that area, too.
GlobalFoundries previously gave up on the kind of leading-edge production that would match the capabilities of TSMC or Samsung.
Instead, it is serving the market for less advanced chips, which are increasingly critical to automakers and other industries.
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