Kuaishou Technology has been eyeing 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 video and live streaming applications gain popularity in China. .
Kuaishou – which competes with ByteDance Ltd., the Chinese rival behind TikTok and its brother app Douyin – started taking orders from investors on Monday. With the offer, which can be valued at more than $ 60 billion, Kuaishou is joining a series of Chinese technology companies that are listed in Hong Kong.
Kuaishou, which means “quick 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 capitalized on the growing demand for young Chinese people to watch and record short videos on their smartphones. Its homonymous short video platform is the second largest in the world, according to data cited in its prospectus, and there were 305 million daily active users of its applications and mini-programs in China during the nine months of September.
With a minimum business value of $ 4.95 billion, the IPO would be the largest in the world since the end of 2019, when Saudi Arabian Oil Co., commonly known as Aramco, raised $ 29.4 billion, show the Dealogic numbers.