Investors with a preference for local stocks should be licking their lips as a flurry of Western Australian companies look to float on the hot Australian Stock Exchange in the lead up to the Christmas break.
Investors with a preference for local stocks should be licking their lips as a flurry of Western Australian companies look to float on the hot Australian Stock Exchange in the lead up to the Christmas break.
Interestingly, a number of them are not the WA staple resource-type floats that the record-breaking market has been lapping up for more than a year now.
Recent lodgings with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission include steel door manufacturing marketer DSG Australia, private tertiary education company IBT Education and engineering consultancy Lycopodium.
South-Perth based JV International is planning an $11 million float through shell technology company, DSG Australia, after a stalled attempt earlier this year.
JV International, which has the international marketing rights to locally made steel door frame manufacturing equipment, is looking to list on the back of a joint venture with Middle East building products supplier Arabian Profile Company Ltd.
The joint venture, Arabian Profile Global, which will be owned 54 per cent by Arabian Profile Company and 46 per cent by JV Global, is hoping to break into the booming United Arab Emirates construction and in places such as Africa and Asia.
JV International had earlier planned the joint venture with giant Indian construction company Larsen & Toubro, however, a change in management put those plans on hold for 12 months.
DSG has issued a prospectus offering a total of 12.5 million, 20 cent shares with an oversubscription for 2.5 million, or 27 per cent of the company to the public.
A similar amount of one cent options is also on offer.
The vendors will retain 46 per cent of the company while private promoters will gain about 10 per cent.
The offer is not being underwritten and DSG, which will change its name to JV Global upon successful listing, hopes to net $2.5 million from the float.
JV International managing director Terry Opie said the money would help the continued marketing and sales of the manufacturing equipment while developing the joint venture company as a business model for other joint ventures throughout the world.
JV International was founded in 1990 by Mr Opie and currently markets roll forming plant and equipment worldwide.
The equipment is manufactured and marketed locally by Bayswater-based Colrol Pty Ltd, which supplies door frame manufacturing equipment to WA building suppliers such as the Buckeridge Group, Stratco and Roofmart.
Mr Opie said after building up the company around the world he had identified significant market potential for steel door frames and other products such as window frames and roofs.
However, while WA’s door frame market is now almost entirely steel, many other markets around the world are still using wood which is more expensive and more susceptible to deterioration.
“One of the reasons we are going public is that I have built all this up by myself and to expand it from here I need assistance,” Mr Opie said.
Another local company that will be hoping its offshore operations can help support its move into the public marketplace is Perth-based engineering consultancy Lycopodium.
The 12-year old business, which has operations throughout Australia and Africa primarily in the mining sector, has grown significantly in the past four years.
Its $36 million dollar float, which is also not underwritten, will raise $6 million dollars through the offer of shares valued at $1 each.
In one of WA’s biggest floats private non-tertiary education provider IBT Education is planning a $346 million float which is due to open on November 18.
