(Bloomberg) -- Springer Nature, the private equity-backed academic publisher, is planning an initial public offering in Frankfurt in what could be the first sizable listing in Europe for the second half of the year.
The offering would comprise €200 million ($220 million) in new equity and an undetermined amount of existing shares held by buyout group BC Partners, according to a statement Thursday. Holtzbrinck Publishing Group, which holds a 53% stake in the company, is not planning to sell stock through the IPO.
Europe’s equity capital markets saw a flurry of initial share-sale activity in the first half of the year before market volatility and the summer break put a pause on new deals. IPOs in the region have raised nearly $15 billion so far in 2024, with the bulk of the sales completed in the first five months, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Thursday’s announcement marks Springer Nature’s latest push to go public after canceling similar plans in 2018 and 2020. The company will now begin a round of investor meetings to define a price range for the sale.
Banks are expected to formally begin taking orders from investors around the last week of September, with the view to price the IPO in early October, according to a person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified because they’re not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.
A deal could value the group at as much as €7 billion, or €9 billion including debt, people familiar told Bloomberg in May.
Revenue, Dividend
Springer Nature, the publisher of science journal Nature and Scientific American, raked in revenues of €1.85 billion last year, leading to an adjusted operating profit of €511 million, according to the statement. That compares to sales of €1.82 billion and profits of €462 million in 2022.
The German group expects to a pay a dividend of €25 million this year, and going forward it will target an annual payout of about 50% of adjusted net income.
Deutsche Bank AG, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley are leading the IPO. BNP Paribas SA, Commerzbank AG, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and UniCredit SpA are joint bookrunners, and Credit Agricole SA and ING Groep NV are co-bookrunners.
(Updates with timing for orders and pricing)
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