SINGAPORE, Aug 6 - The first listing of a multinational Indonesian technology company in Southeast Asian region on Friday will set the benchmark for IPO hopefuls in a region where global investors are chasing fast growing e-commerce markets.
PT Bukalapak.com Tbk, a 11-year-old e-commerce company backed by Ant Group, Singapore sovereign fund GIC and local media and tech conglomerate Emtek, makes its market debut after raising $1.5 billion in Indonesia's largest public offering of both companies.
The first listing of a venture-backed company in a country cluttered with founder-led startups has fuelled a frenzy among large and institutional investors who are scrambling to get a piece of the IPO in a market that has seen few small flotations.
I'm expecting to get some capital gain for the listing since it will get a lot of buy ratings, said Andry Taneli, a retail investor, who cited Bukalapak's size among local tech firms and its anticipated strong liquidity against peers.
The IPO comes as Indonesia's $40 billion e-commerce market is getting a boost from stay-at-home consumers and a shift to sell online by more businesses in the pandemic.
Bukalapak is a micro, small and medium-sized business in Southeast Asia's largest economy. It is the fourth biggest e-commerce player after Tokopedia, Sea Ltd's Shopee and Alibaba's Lazada.
Investor interest is also running high ahead of a planned multibillion-dollar IPO of GoTo, Indonesia's most valuable startup formed through the merger of ride-hailing and food delivery firm Gojek and e-commerce leader Tokopedia.
Bukalapak, which is also backed by Microsoft, began to raise $300 million earlier this year, but ended up raising $1.5 billion.
This was inspired by approximately $6.5 billion of interest by about 150 retail investors and more than 100,000 institutional investors, two sources familiar with the matter said. Retail part of IPO was doubled to 5%.
This IPO has also demonstrated that Southeast Asia technology companies can attain a significant valuation for growth with market demand, said Nicolo Magni of UBS, head of global banking for Southeast Asia and India, the joint global coordinators for the issue with Bank of America.
This creates a platform for other companies to have in Indonesia or other regional exchanges successful offerings to list at sizeable, highly successful services, said Magni.
Loss-making Bukalapak’s IPO was valued at the top of its 750 and 850 rupiah per share range, and the firm was priced at $6 billion.