With a healthy jobs report, Nasdaq rallied last week. However, this did not
mean much for the IPO market. With the Fourth of July holiday, there was
not much time to launch IPOs. In fact, there were no IPOs until Friday.
But it was a good Friday for InfoVista
. The IPO was priced at $12.23, at almost at the
top-end of the trading range of $10.58-$12.31. InfoVista opened at $14-1/2
and the stock ended the trading day at $30-1/4 (the high was $39.25).
The company was founded in Paris in 1995. InfoVista’s technology monitors
and analyzes corporate networks. Many of its clients are European, such as
France Telecom (in all, there are 285 customers). Although, the company does
have a substantial presence in U.S. markets. For example, there are reseller
agreements with Cisco and 3Com.
As of the nine months ended March 31, InfoVista had revenues of $2.9 million
and losses of $4.8 million. InfoVista offered 6 million shares, raising
about $73 million.
Actually, most of this week’s IPOs were delayed. But expect these to be
priced this week.
The delays included:
divine
interVentures: The company is an Internet incubator, investing in
start-ups. However, incubators are out-of-favor — which helps explain the
delay in the IPO. Apparently, the company will price its IPO below the
current price range of $13-$15.
The flamboyant founder of the company, Andrew “Flip” Filipowski, fired his
original underwriter, CS First Boston. Rumor was that CS First Boston
wanted to delay the IPO until later this year.
Now the lead underwriter is Robertson Stephens and the proposed ticker
symbol is DVIN.
Entegris:
The company develops technologies that monitor semiconductor wafers. The
company plans to issue 13 million shares at a range of $13-$15 (the original
price range was $15-$17). The lead underwriter is Merrill Lynch.
The company has profits, which were $5.7 million in 1999. Revenues were
$242 million.
