IDG, Carlyle re-up in China online real estate portal SouFun
IDG Capital Partners and The Carlyle Group will invest between $400 million and $700 million in US-listed Chinese online real estate portal SouFun Holdings, alongside company management.
This follows a commitment of up to $1 billion from the same investors in August. The capital was intended to support the company's planned transition from an information platform into a transaction-oriented model.
SouFun, which operates the Fang.com portal, said that the PE firms and company management will subscribe to equal sums in Class A ordinary shares and convertible notes. The shares will be priced at $29.25 apiece - or $5.85 per American Depository Share, which represents a slight premium to the September 16 closing price.
The notes have a 1.5% coupon and can be converted into Class A shares after seven years at a 122.5% premium to the price of the current issue of ordinary shares.
"With the new investment, the company will be in a better position to strengthen its transformation. The company will expand aggressively to more cities and rapidly increase its market share in existing cities with its new transaction and financial service business lines," Vincent Mo, chairman and CEO of SouFun, said in a statement.
The company provides marketing, e-commerce, listing, finance and other value-added services for the real estate and home-related sectors. It currently has about 100 offices nationwide and covers more than 370 cities. In the fourth quarter of 2014, Fang.com received a monthly average of around 53.2 million unique visitors and 1.6 billion website visits.
SouFun was founded in 1999 and acquired by Australia's Telstra International Holdings in 2006. Telstra later sold its entire stake in SouFun's 2010 IPO, which raised $124 million. Apax Partners and General Atlantic each took a 19% stake for $163 million at that time.
The company reported revenue of $702.9 million in 2014, up from $637.4 million the previous year. Net income dropped from $298.7 million to $253.2 million over the same period, largely due to rising marketing expenditure.
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