Time to revisit the ‘upsizing IPO’ strategy?

IN RECENT weeks, two relatively large initial public offers (IPOs) were announced: NTT’s data centre real estate investment trust (Reit), whose assets are valued at US$1.6 billion and which is looking to raise about S$988 million, and Info-Tech Systems, which at its offer price of S$0.87 per share had a market capitalisation of S$224.5 million.

Their entry is welcome in a market that has struggled to attract large new listings for many years now, with the overwhelming majority of fresh entrants being small, sometimes-unprofitable companies on the Catalist with market values well below S$100 million.

Interestingly, the entry of the two new big listings brings to mind events almost exactly 20 years ago in July 2005 when the Singapore Exchange (SGX) announced an “upsizing’’ goal, which was a bold, rebranding strategy aimed at attracting bigger companies to list here.