NEW YORK, Nov 9 — The initial public offering for China’s second-largest search engine, Sogou Inc, was priced at US$13 (RM55) per American Depository share (ADS), according to a source close to the matter, at the top end of the expected range of US$11 to US$13.
The 45 million ADS offering, with each ADS representing one of the company’s Class A ordinary share, raised about US$585 million and is expected to debut on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “SOGO” today.
Chinese tech giant Tencent Holdings, a major Sogou shareholder, uses Sogou Search as the default search engine in its Mobile QQ browser and qq.com site.
Sogou is a unit of China’s Sohu.com Inc, an internet service company that includes search and gaming platforms and will remain as Sogou’s controlling shareholder after the IPO.
Proceeds from the offering will be used for research and development and marketing purposes, Sogou said in its IPO filing.
Beijing-based Sogou, which competes with Baidu and Alibaba’s UCWeb, reported net income of US$66.7 million for the nine months ended Sept. 30, compared with US$45.4 million for the same period a year earlier.
JP Morgan, Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs and CICC were among top underwriters to the offering. — Reuters
