Arm’s listing will raise up to $10 billion

SoftBank Group has begun exploring investor interest in an initial public offering (IPO) of British processor developer Arm — the Japanese conglomerate could raise up to $10 billion, reports Bloomberg citing own sources.

Image source: arm.com

The sale of Arm securities in New York could start as early as September, according to Bloomberg sources who wished to remain anonymous, and the IPO has every chance of becoming the largest in the world this year. Arm filed confidentially for a U.S. listing in April, with banks listed as Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Barclays and Mizuho Financial Group. The list is expected to continue to grow.

Discussions are ongoing and final decisions on the size and timing of the IPO will be made depending on conditions in the stock markets. SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son said he hopes Arm’s IPO will be the biggest ever for a chip developer. Bankers valued Arm at between $30 billion and $70 billion, a difficult task given the volatility in stock prices of semiconductor industry players.

According to the results of the fourth quarter of the last financial year, Arm’s net sales increased by 28% compared to the same period of the previous year and amounted to 92.8 billion yen ($688 million). The company’s quarterly loss amounted to 6.2 billion yen ($46 million), although a profit of 10.1 billion yen ($75 million) was noted a year earlier.