UPDATE 2-UK's Autonomy seeks greater fame on Nasdaq
(Adds CEO interview, details of float)
biz.yahoo.com
By Richard Meares
LONDON, May 9 (Reuters) - Autonomy Corp Plc said on Tuesday it was listing some $200 million of shares on Nasdaq to help boost the British software company's profile in its biggest market, the United States.
Autonomy said it would list 2.2 million shares from Wednesday at $124 per share, a thin discount to Monday's $127 mid-price close on the pan-European high-tech Easdaq in Brussels, its only home to date.
Chief Executive Mike Lynch told Reuters that U.S. clients preferred to deal with companies listed there and found Easdaq ``a bit exotic''.
``Listing on Nasdaq has always been our stated goal and although we started in Europe, our U.S. operations now outstrip the rest of the world,'' he said.
The New York listing will represent 5.3 percent of Autonomy's equity which Lynch said he hoped would be enough to meet U.S. demand.
Some 880,000 shares are a new issue that will raise $109 million for the company, which uses pattern-matching algorithms drawing on information technology, probability theory and arcane maths to help computers ``understand'' unstructured human prose.
Lynch said the money would be used partly to expand into southeast Asia and Latin America.
The rest of the stock is being sold by existing shareholders including Lynch, Britain's first Internet-related billionaire who said he disposed of shares worth some $30 million but still owns about a fifth of the five-billion-dollar company.
STAR OF BUMPY HIGH-TECH SECTOR
``It is amazing how many people have still never heard of this company,'' said James Middleton of Tilney Fund Management.
``This listing will bring them a higher profile.''
The tranche of new stock is tiny compared to the nearly 42 million Autonomy shares in issue.
``The company is getting very near to break-even so there is no point raising more money than it needs,'' Lynch said.
Autonomy, based in the university city of Cambridge which is surrounding itself with high-tech industry, has seen its share price rise by 160.8 percent so far this year, outperforming the Easdaq market by 121.2 percent.
It has shared the bumpy ride for technology stocks, hitting a peak of $218 earlier this year before wallowing as low as $46.25.
Derek Brown, European Internet analyst at Robertson Stephens, said competition for the stock would be tougher on Nasdaq than in Europe, where it had been seen as the single player in its field.
``There will be more companies on the landscape for U.S. investors to benchmark Autonomy against,'' he said.
Brown has a ``long-term attractive'' rating on the stock and said U.S. competitors included Excalibur (NasdaqNM:EXCA - news), Vignette (NasdaqNM:VIGN - news) and Inktomi (NasdaqNM:INKT - news).
Autonomy reported a 1999 pre-tax loss of 680,000 pounds ($1.04 million) on March 9, down from a loss of 1.74 million pounds in 1998.
The shares will be offered in the form of American depository shares and will trade under the symbol (Nasdaq:AUTN - news).
Deutsche Bank Alex Brown, Bank of America Securities, Wit Soundview and Dresdner Kleinwort Benson are the underwriters for the new share issue.
Autonomy and one of the selling shareholders have also granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to 330,000 additional shares.
(Additional reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta)
($1 equals .6536 Pound)
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I'm going to PM the SI admin powers that be and get a ticker added to the thread.
Regards,
dkg |
