"We chose to list on the Korean stock market to expand collaboration with Korea's semiconductor ecosystem and grow together."
Don Anand, CEO of TeraView Holdings, appeared at an initial public offering (IPO) press briefing held on the 19th at the British Embassy in Jung-gu, Seoul, and said, "Korea is both our target market, where major global semiconductor manufacturers are based, and an Asian hub connecting Taiwan and Japan."
TeraView Holdings, a precision inspection equipment corporation based on "terahertz" and headquartered in Cambridge, the United Kingdom, will become the first U.K. corporation to list on the KOSDAQ market. It formally began its listing push by filing a preliminary listing review with the Korea Exchange (KRX) in May, and proposed a post-listing valuation of up to 284.1 billion won.
Terahertz is an electromagnetic wave that oscillates 1 trillion times per second and is regarded as next-generation precision inspection technology that can replace electron beam-based inspection equipment. TeraView Holdings was the first to commercialize terahertz-based inspection equipment, and it supplied semiconductor inspection equipment to Samsung Electronics as early as 2011.
Anand said, "Terahertz can also perform density inspection, so Korean secondary battery manufacturers are showing increasing interest," adding, "In the semiconductor institutional sector, our products are already being adopted in production lines, and a KOSDAQ listing is also a commitment to strengthen responses such as after-sales management."
The company previously received investment from the Samsung group in 2017. At that time, a new technology investment association formed by Samsung Venture Investment participated in TeraView Holdings' paid-in capital increase and secured 4% equity. In addition, Samsung Securities participated in the company's pre-IPO (fundraising before listing) in Nov. last year and acquired 2.7% equity.
It was also learned that after listing on the KOSDAQ market, the company set a policy to separately establish a research and development (R&D) organization in Korea. Anand said, "We will have to watch the growth trajectory after listing, including revenue, but the goal is to create an R&D organization and triple headcount every year going forward."
Anand also emphasized that TeraView Holdings can achieve steady growth. Demand for terahertz inspection equipment is increasing due to the advancement of semiconductor packaging. Anand said, "Nvidia has put terahertz on the top-priority inspection equipment for all chip suppliers."
Meanwhile, TeraView Holdings chose to list depositary receipts (DR). DRs will be issued based on the original shares issued in the U.K., and domestic investors will trade the DRs like common stock. The public offering size is 5 million DRs, and the desired offering price range is set at 7,000 to 8,000 won.
The company began bookbuilding for institutional investors on the 13th. It plans to close bookbuilding that day and finalize the offering price on the 20th. Subscriptions for retail investors will be held from the 21st to the 22nd. The listing date is scheduled for Dec. 9. The lead manager is Samsung Securities.