Steve Jobs' favorite! "Ugly Shoes" brand Birkenstock lands on the US stock market with a valuation of $8.6 billion.
LVMH's investment, the love of Steve Jobs and supermodels, the "ugly shoes" have been listed, becoming the third largest IPO in the US stock market this year.
Entering October, the autumn is bleak, but the US IPO market is booming.
Birkenstock, which appeared in the popular movie "Barbie" this summer and became popular all over the Internet, is about to debut on the New York Stock Exchange today. The IPO price is set at $46 per share, with a valuation of over $8.6 billion. The pricing is slightly lower than the midpoint of the target range of $44 to $49 per share set by the company.
Birkenstock plans to raise $1.5 billion in this IPO, one-third of which will be used to repay debt, and the remaining proceeds will go to L Catterton, a consumer investment fund under LVMH. According to Dealogic data, Birkenstock's listing is the third largest IPO in the United States this year.
L Catterton previously acquired a majority stake in Birkenstock for 4 billion euros in 2021. The prospectus shows that Financière Agache, the holding company of LVMH Group CEO Bernard Arnault's family, plans to purchase up to $325 million in shares. Alexandre Arnault, the third son of LVMH, may join Birkenstock's board of directors after the IPO.
In addition, the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund and Durable Capital Partners also plan to purchase up to $300 million in Birkenstock shares.
Established in 1774, Birkenstock is a long-established German shoe manufacturer, mainly producing simple-designed "old money style" sandals. Supermodel Kendall and other fashionistas have been seen wearing Birkenstock's "ugly shoes" on the streets. Last year, a pair of Birkenstock sandals, which was the favorite of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, was sold for a sky-high price of $218,800 at an online auction, setting the highest transaction record for similar items.
According to the prospectus, Birkenstock's revenue reached 1.1 billion euros in the nine months ending in June, a year-on-year increase of 21%. However, net profit declined by 20% to 103 million euros.
In September, three tech companies, Arm, Instacart, and Klaviyo, successively went public on the US stock market, and their IPO prices all reached or exceeded the highest price in the target range. Today's listing of Birkenstock confirms that the US IPO market may have significantly rebounded.
This is also the second IPO of a company invested by L Catterton in just a few months, following the listing of beauty tech company Oddity Tech on Nasdaq in July.