Montreal point-of-sale (POS) software provider Lightspeed announced on Wednesday its plan to list publicly in the United States through the New York Stock Exchange.
Lightspeed has filed an application to list its subordinate voting shares on the exchange. A total of 11,650,000 voting shares will be offered for sale as part of the initial public offering.
Ten million of those voting shares are coming from Lightspeed’s treasury, while 1.65 million subordinate voting shares will be offered by Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, which according to The Globe and Mail is Lightspeed’s largest shareholder. The Montreal company said the trading of the shares is expected to commence on the exchange following the pricing of its offering.
The underwriters for the offering include Morgan Stanley, Barclays and BMO Capital, along with eight other US banks. The company, along with “certain members” of its management team, including founder and CEO Dax Dasilva, are also granting the underwriters the right to buy an additional 1.74 million subordinate voting shares. This, according to the filing, represents the aggregate 15 percent of the total number of subordinate voting shares to be sold pursuant to the offering and is exercisable for a period of 30 days from the date of the closing.
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Lightspeed stated that the net proceeds from US public offering will be used primarily to strengthen its financial position and allow it to “pursue its growth strategies.”
The decision to list publicly in the US follows an interesting year for Lightspeed, which sells its POS software to small businesses. While the startup reported strong year-over-year growth in fiscal first-quarter 2021, which ended June 30, 2020, it also faced flat revenue and customer growth due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite dips in transaction volume and new customer growth, Lightspeed has also seen the effects of small businesses moving increasingly to a digital approach. Revenue for Lightspeed Payments trended upwards year-over-year throughout Q1 2021, resulting in a record month in June, which the startup said was led by increased online sales, new customer adoption, and strong performance across several verticals.
The pursuit of the NYSE listing comes a year and a half after Lightspeed officially went public on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX).
Closing of the offering is still subject to a number of customary conditions, including the entering into of the definitive underwriting agreement, the listing of the subordinate voting shares issued by Lightspeed as part of the offering on the NYSE and the TSX, and any required approvals of the NYSE and the TSX.
Image source Lightspeed via Facebook