Kathmandu Said to Plan Share Sale as Early as October

Kathmandu Said to Plan Share Sale as Early as October
Bloomberg, 22-Sep-09
By Angus Whitley

Kathmandu, the outdoor equipment retailer with shops across New Zealand and Australia, may sell shares in an initial public offering as early as next month, two people familiar with the matter said.

The Christchurch-based company, jointly owned by Goldman Sachs JBWere Pty and Quadrant Private Equity, will probably decide within two weeks whether to proceed with the sale, the people said, declining to be identified because the plans aren’t public. The IPO may raise about A$400 million ($345 million), based on preliminary estimates, one of the people said.

Kathumandu’s sale would follow that of Myer Group Pty, Australia’s largest department store operator, which plans to file for an IPO next week. The two retailers are among at least four private equity-controlled businesses that may go public in coming months to tap a cash surplus among local investors that Bank of America Merrill Lynch estimates at about A$200 billion.

Macquarie Group Ltd., Australia’s largest investment bank, and Goldman Sachs JBWere have been hired as advisers, the people said. Hayley Morris, a spokeswoman for Goldman Sachs JBWere in Sydney, and Chris Hadley, Quadrant’s managing director and a Kathmandu director, didn’t return phone calls seeking comment. Paula Hannaford, a Macquarie spokeswoman, declined to comment.

Kathmandu declined to comment, it said in an e-mailed statement.

Goldman Sachs JBWere and Quadrant led the leveraged buyout of Kathmandu for NZ$275 million ($195 million) in April 2006. In September that year, the firms bought the remaining 49 percent stake from Jan Cameron, who founded the retailer in 1987.

Camping Equipment

Kathmandu has more than 80 stores in Australia, New Zealand and the U.K., according to its Web site. The company’s products include own-branded backpacks, jackets, sleeping bags and camping equipment.

The sale may take place in late October or early November, within about a week of the Myer listing, and Kathmandu’s owners haven’t decided how much of the business to sell, the people said. The company, which also has an office in Melbourne, may opt for a dual listing in Australia and New Zealand, one of the people said.

Australian companies, most of them retailers, may announce more than A$10 billion of initial share sales by June, UBS AG, the biggest arranger of stock offerings in Australia since 2006, said this month. IPOs in the nation raised a combined A$674 million so far this year, according to the stock exchange.

Melbourne-based Myer said this month it plans to lodge an IPO prospectus on Sept. 28. The company, part-owned by Texas- based TPG Inc., may raise at least A$2 billion, according to Tribeca Investment Partners in Sydney, making it Australia’s largest offering since 2007.

Forty-five companies went public in the 12 months ended June 30, according to the operator of Australia’s stock exchange. That was the smallest number since 1993 and marked an 81 percent drop from a year earlier.