Fender Musical Instruments Corporations said on Monday it plans to sell 10.7 million shares at between $13 per share to $15 per share, which could see it raise up to $160.5m.
The company plans to list on Nasdaq under the symbol FNDR.
Its largest shareholders at the moment are venture firm Weston Presidio (42.92%), and Japan-based corporations Yamano Music (14.2%), Kanda Shokai Corporation (12.85%), the trust of William Schultz, once called “the man who saved Fender” by news provider the Chicago Sun Times. Weston.
A spokeswoman said in March: “Yamano has been a shareholder since 1985 and Kanda Shokai since 1988.”
The flotation is advised by JP Morgan, William Blair, Baird, Stifel Nicolaus Weisel, and Wells Fargo.
Guitar aficionados credit Fender Japan as producing some of the best post-1960s Fender guitars, which effectively revived some of the company’s vintage guitar products in the 1980s, according to one fan website. One guitar industry figure is quoted in this website, as saying: “Everybody came up to inspect the [Fender Japan guitars] and the guys almost cried, because the Japanese product was so good – it was what we had been having a hell of a time trying to do.”
Yamano’s links to Fender stretch back to 1960s, while Kanda Shokai is widely credited as one of the driving forces in the development of Fender Japan by guitar aficionados.
Fender Electric Instrument Company was founded in 1946 by Leo Fender. In 1965, Leo Fender sold the business to Columbia Records Distribution Corp, part of Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS). The business was bought from Columbia by William Schultz and current Board member, William Mendello in a buyout in 1985.
In 2002 Weston Presidio backed the company alongside Roland Corporation, a Japan-listed musical instrument and electronics company.
In 2011 the company had sales of $700m and net income of $19m.