List of new IPO

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List of new IPO
Post-Budget, the primary market seems all set to hot up after a brief lull. With stock markets on fire, another public offer boom appears to be imminent.

Market sources say the three months of March, April and May will see more than two dozen IPOs and secondary offerings hitting the market to raise over Rs 8,000 crore.

Among the important offers are Oriental Bank of Commerce (estimated to be around Rs 2,000 crore), Bank of Baroda (around Rs 1,500 crore), Allahabad Bank (around Rs 700 crore), YES Bank (around Rs 300 crore), IVRCL Infrastructure (around Rs 270 crore), Jaypee Hydro Power (around Rs 180 crore) and 3i Infonet (around Rs 175 crore).

Other public issues in the offing are those of Gokuldas and Provogue. Market sources say lead managers are getting busy with the peak season.

ICICI Securities, Enam, JM Morgan Securities, Kotak and SBI Caps have landed big mandates. Most of the offers are taking the book-building route. A few offers have already hit the market.

These include Punjab National Bank (Rs 3,000 crore), Gateway Distriparks (Rs 150 crore) and Emami (Rs 35 crore).

The current boom is not dominated by pure IPOs; most large-sized issues have come from already listed companies. Overall demand is quite positive. So we expect forthcoming issues to evoke a good response from investors. Fearing that their demand may not be fully met in public offers, FIIs have already started buying the shares of banks like OBC and Allahabad Bank from the secondary market, says a senior official with a leading merchant banker.

The primary market will also see medium or small-sized issues from existing companies in non-banking sectors. Era Constructions and Alps Industries are examples of such issues. The size of these issues ranges from Rs 49 crore to Rs 145 crore.

ICICI Securities (I-Sec) has landed at least half-a-dozen large-sized offers. Apart from the current PNB issue, I-Sec will also manage a few other major offers like OBC, Allahabad Bank, Jaiprakash Hydro and 3i Infotech. While the Allahabad Bank offer is expected in the second week of April, OBCs offer is likely to hit the market by April-end.

A few issues are set to hit the market next week. For instance, IVRCL Infrastructure and Projects, which is a listed company, will hit the market on March 18, and is planning to raise Rs 126 crore via a greenshoe option aggregating Rs 144.9 crore. Enam Financial Consultants is the sole book-running lead manager to the issue.

Many small and medium sized IT firms, including Servion Global Solutions, Accel-ICIM Frontline, Bahwan Cybertek and Dax Networks, are planning initial public offerings (IPOs) to fund their growth and expansion plans.

Though the timeframe for the IPOs is yet to be finalised, it is learnt that the companies would hit the market in the next 12-18 months.

Many of these companies are closely-held while some of them have significant holdings by foreign partners or private equity funds.

According to merchant banking sources, there was a strong appetite for good quality IPOs and these companies could form the next wave from the IT sector, after the first one in the late '80s and early '90s when Infosys, Satyam and Wipro hit the stock markets.

These IT firms have an annual turnover of Rs 50-150 crore and will look at diluting the capital base by at least 20 per cent through the public issues.

Servion Global Solutions, which is expected to post a turnover of USD 12 million during this fiscal, is going ahead with its plan for the IPO, a top company official confirmed.

Private equity funds Citigroup and TDA Capital hold 32 per cent and seven per cent stakes respectively in the company, but it is not clear whether these funds would exit or dilute their stakes during the IPO.

Servion Global, according to the company official, was looking at both the domestic and the overseas markets for the proposed IPO.

Another company which is lining up an IPO is Chennai-based Accel-ICIM Frontline Ltd. "We are looking at an IPO. It could be during next year," a company official said.

Accel-ICIM Frontline is expected to post a turnover of Rs 156 crore during this fiscal. Frontline Technologies Corporation, an IT services firm listed on the Singapore Exchange Main Board, holds 40 per cent stake in the Chennai-headquartered Accel-ICIM.

IT solutions firm Bahwan Cybertek, which is the IT division of Oman-based Bahwan Group, is also expected to hit the market during the next 12-18 months period. The company, which has offices in Chennai, Bangalore and Mumbai, houses a significant portion of its 300 employees at its development centre in Chennai.

"We are planning an IPO. The SEBI (Securities and Exchange Board of India) guidelines require 20 per cent dilution of the capital through the IPO," S Durgaprasad, Director and CEO of Bahwan Cybertek, told PTI.

Similarly, networking solutions firm Dax Networks, its country manager C Sujit Singh said, was "seriously exploring" an IPO to fund its expansion plans for the ASEAN region.

The company which plans to increase its market share in the Indian router market from the current two per cent to 10 per cent, is confident of raising the required funds for expansion through the IPO.
List of new IPO