In an upcoming initial public offering of Cuckoo Electronics, Korea's largest rice cooker maker, the world's big investors such as BlackRock and Fidelity have shown interest in taking part in. According to a demand survey, the aggregate amount the overseas investors are willing to invest was as much as US$6 billion. This is unusual for a mid-sized company's IPO to attract that much investment sum from overseas.
In the demand survey held by Cuckoo Electronics for two days between July 23 and 24 on institutional investors, companies like Wellington Management Co., Fidelity, and BlackRock participated. Singapore's GIC Private Ltd. was also interested in the IPO. According to Cuckoo, as many as 70 percent out of 711 institutional investors in the demand survey were foreign investment companies.
Oh Doo-gyun, analyst with E-Trade Securities, said, "Big investors like BlackRock don't show up in domestic demand surveys. It is unprecedented for a mid-sized firm's IPO to draw attention of major foreign investment firms.
Chung Hyun-gyo, chief financial officer of Cuckoo Electronics, said, "I was surprised to learn that so many foreign investors were familiar with our brand name. I think that's because Cuckoo is increasingly known in China as a premium brand."
China's electric rice cooker market is estimated at 2 trillion won. Of this, Cuckoo Electronics accounted for about 2 percent (40 billion won) last year. The company expects to make more than 60 billion won of sales in the Chinese market alone, up 50 percent from the previous year. Its total sales revenue this year is expected to reach 499.5 billion won, up 15 percent from 2013.
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