Kuaishou Technology has its eyes on the world’s largest initial public offering in more than a year, seeking to raise about $ 5 billion from a Hong Kong stock sale as short and live streaming applications grow in popularity. in China.
Kuaishou – which competes with ByteDance Ltd., the Chinese rival company behind TikTok and sister app Douyin – began receiving orders from investors on Monday. With the offer, which could be valued at over $ 60 billion, Kuaishou joins a number of Chinese technology companies listed in Hong Kong.
Kuaishou, which means “fast hand” in Chinese, is supported by Tencent Holdings Ltd. It was co-founded by Su Hua and Cheng Yixiao, software engineers who previously worked for Google China and Hewlett Packard, respectively.
Both Kuaishou and ByteDance have capitalized on the growing demand of younger Chinese to watch and record short videos on their smartphones. The eponymous short video platform is the second largest in the world, according to data cited in its prospectus, and there were an average of 305 million daily active users of its applications and mini-programs in China for the nine months of September.
With a minimum transaction size of $ 4.95 billion, the IPO would be the largest in the world since the end of 2019, when Saudi Arabian Oil Co., known as Aramco, raised $ 29.4 billion. shows Dealogic figures.