Australia's Aconex targets $120m IPO, PE to exit
US-based PE investor Francisco Partners will fully exit Australia’s Aconex as the cloud-based project management platform for the construction industry raises A$140 million ($120 million) through an IPO.
The company will sell 73.7 million shares at A$1.90 apiece, according to a statement. Last month, Aconex abandoned plans to raise A$230 million with a larger offering priced at A$2.20 per share in response to concerns about post-listing performance at this valuation.
Of the proceeds from the upcoming sale, approximately A$90 million will go to existing shareholders, with Francisco Partners planning to sell its entire 23.9% stake, or 32.9 million shares. The private equity firm stands to receive A$62.5 million, plus a compensation payment of $23.5 million from Aconex. Francisco Partners invested A$57.5 million in the company in 2008.
Aconex was founded in 2000 by Leigh Jasper and Rob Phillpot - who are also selling some shares but will retain a combined 15.8% stake in the business - as a construction collaboration and procurement management services provider. It now operates as a software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform allowing centralized management of documents, data and communications.
The company currently has 650 paying customers and over 50,000 user organizations working on projects valued at more than A$800 billion. With 41 offices across 22 countries, the Aconex platform has been used to manage over 1.18 billion documents to date.
Projects include the Panama Canal expansion, the Dubai Metro construction, the Roy Hill Mine development in Western Australia, the Venetian Macao, the Battersea Power Station redevelopment in London, and the New York City Hall reconstruction.
"We believe that Aconex will benefit from the growing adoption of cloud collaboration software in the construction industry worldwide," Jasper, the company's CEO, said in a statement. "The rising complexity and cost of construction projects, the digitization of project documents and workflows, and the adoption of increasingly advanced design tools, such as building information modeling, are all increasing the customer benefits of using Aconex."
The company posted pro forma revenues of A$66.2 million in the 2014 financial year, up from A$52.3 million in 2013. The business has yet to turn profitable with net losses of A$9.9 million in 2014 and A$17.2 million in 2013. Aconex expects to return a net profit of A$2.6 million for the 2015 calendar year.
Macquarie and UBS are joint lead managers for the offering.
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