The Chinese manufacturer of electric cars Nio sees big. He has mandated eight banks including Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, for an IPO this year in New York, according to Reuters, which quotes sources close to the case. The operation could allow him to raise up to two billion dollars (1.6 billion euros).
Nio, founded in 2014 in Shanghai by Chinese entrepreneur William Li, needs fresh capital to finance expansion in areas such as autonomous driving and batteries, according to one source. The start-up, called NextEV in its infancy, also intends to take advantage of a growing environment for electric cars in China to establish itself as a global tenor in this future segment alongside the American Tesla.
Although the Chinese car market slowed sharply in 2017, sales of new-energy vehicles (NEVs) have performed well. Last month, the Chinese Automobile Manufacturers Association said it expects a 40% increase in electric car sales this year on the world’s largest market, to over a million units, thanks in part to tax incentives. that the government has decided to extend for one year, until the end of 2020.
The most important IPO of a Chinese to United States from Alibaba
According to sources, Nio intends to raise between one and two billion dollars during its planned public offer in the second half, which, at the top of the range, would make the largest IPO of a Chinese company in the United States since the $ 25 billion raised by online trading giant Alibaba Group in 2014. In October 2016, the Chinese logistics group ZTO Express raised $ 1.41 billion by breaking into the New York Stock Exchange.
Nio launched in December its first model in China, a seven-seat electric SUV called ES8 and sold about half as cheaply as the Tesla Model X. The company also aims to market a self-driving electric vehicle in the US market here 2020. Nio, which is backed by Chinese technology giant Tencent Holdings and private equity firms Hillhouse Capital Group and Sequoia Capital, raised more than $ 1 billion in last November’s round of financing. , which valued the firm at more than five billion dollars. Nio did not wish to speak about its IPO projects and no comment could be obtained from the banks mentioned.
With Reuters