Made.com targets £775.3m valuation in London float
Made.com, the online furniture retailer, has revealed it will be valued at £775.3m when it floats the business on the London Stock Exchange.
The company, which was launched just 11 years ago with £2.5m in financing, was co-founded by entrepreneur Ning Li and Brent Hoberman, best-known for the dotcom boom business Lastminute.com
Made.com will sell its shares for 200p each.
It said money raised from the float will allow it to "accelerate" growth.
While Made.com has seven showrooms - two in the UK and five elsewhere in Europe - it is focussed on online sales.
In the first three months of this year, about 52% of its sales were in the UK market with the remainder coming from Europe.
It plans to use the money it raises from the flotation to expand its business further across Europe, although it is not planning any more physical showrooms.
Made.com chief executive Philippe Chainieux said: "A listing in London, where the business was founded, will enable us to accelerate our growth as we lead the development of the online furniture and homewares market as it moves online, both in the UK and internationally."
Made.com will raise £100m of new money as a result of 50 million new shares being issued. Existing shareholders will sell a further £93.8m worth of shares.
Although Mr Hoberman is no longer actively involved in the running of the company, he is still a shareholder, as is Ning Li, who was chief executive until the end of 2016 and is now a non-executive director.
The company was also co-founded by entrepreneurs Julien Callède and Chloe Macintosh, who was the firm's creative director.
Made.com employs about 600 staff, all of whom have been given £10,000 in share options.
The firm's sales have been boosted over the course of the Covid pandemic as more people, confined to home during lockdowns, have shopped online and bought more furniture and other homewares.
Sales hit £315m in 2020, a year-on-year rise of 30%, and in the first three months of this year they grew by 63% to £110m.
Made,com joins a series of online retailers to have floated recently, including earlier this year, greetings card firm Moonpig, wine company Virgin Wines and Deliveroo.
