Tech's other hot IPO candidate is hurtling toward its day on Wall Street.
King.com, the London-based maker of Candy Crush Saga,
has quietly filed an S-1 document with the Securities and Exchange
Commission worth an estimated $5 billion, according to a report in
London's Daily Telegraph, citing an anonymous source.
King's
reported filing is similar to the one that allowed Twitter to keep its
IPO confidential last week. King hired a chief financial officer, Hope
Cochran, this week. She held the same title at Clearwire, which built
the first 4G network in the USA and merged with Sprint in 2012.
Both
anticipated public stock offerings come amid a dearth of tech public
offerings. Just one in six new U.S. listings this year have been
tech-related stocks, making 2013 potentially the second-worst showing in
20 years, according to data provider Dealogic. At the height of the
dot-com boom, in 1999, 69% of all IPOs were technology or Internet
companies.
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King.com CEO Riccardo Zacconi. (Photo: King.com)
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The 22 tech-related U.S. IPOs this year – out of 134 – have raised $3.4 billion.
Tech's
lag is a clear byproduct of Facebook's disappointing IPO debut in May
2012. Before it, Zynga stumbled out of the IPO gate in December 2011.
King could trigger more tech-centric public offerings, including long-rumored IPOs for Box and Dropbox in 2014.
Published on: USAtoday
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