Miniforce producer aims to become Asia's top children's platform with IPO

The South Korean producer of famous animated series such as Miniforce aims to become Asia’s top children's platform by way of an initial public offering despite soured investor sentiment for new stock listings.

SAMG Entertainment Co. plans to raise up to 46.7 billion won ($35.6 million) with its market capitalization estimated as high as 238.8 billion won through a listing on South Korea’s junior bourse Kosdaq next month, according to investment banking sources on Tuesday.

The animation studio is set to offer 1.75 million shares at a price guidance of between 21,600 and 26,700 won apiece. It is scheduled to hold a two-day bookbuilding Nov. 17-18 to set an IPO price, followed by a public subscription Nov. 24-25 for a listing on Dec. 6.

SAMG co-produced Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir, which was popular in Europe and Latin America, while releasing other famous animated series and characters for kids such as Superdino. Its YouTube channels including Miniforce TV have a combined 40 million subscribers with 50 billion cumulative views.

The company also succeeded in its toy business based on the intellectual properties of its animated characters. It ranked No. 5 in China’s toy market with the Miniforce characters in 2016.

It turned to the black in the first half as its sales soared 150% to 31.9 billion won, not far from its total revenue of 38.4 billion won in full-year 2021. Sales are expected to top 80 billion won this year.

The local IPO market has been dampened by sluggish demand and cancellations of long-awaited, large-cap IPO candidates.

Write to Ye-Jin Jun at ace@hankyung.com
Jongwoo Cheon edited this article.