Boku, the US-based commerce platform developer backed by telecommunications company Telefónica, aims to raise up to £45m ($59.4m) in an initial public offering in the UK next week, TechCrunch has reported.
Boku has built a mobile commerce platform that incorporates features such as mobile bill-based payment for apps, mobile authentication and mobile checkout for mobile merchants, and analysis and optimisation tools for mobile operators.
The IPO will take place on the London Stock Exchange’s Alternative Investment Market and a £45m offering would give Boku a valuation of £125m.
About £30m of the proceeds will go to existing investors and the remaining capital will support company growth, TechCrunch understands.
Telefónica’s now defunct corporate venturing unit, Telefónica Digital, joined Khosla Ventures, Benchmark Capital, New Enterprise Associates, Index Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz and DAG Ventures for the company’s 2012 round, which raised $35m.
The IPO will follow $91m in venture funding, the most recent of which was a $13.8m round that closed in September 2016, and which featured NEA, Index, Khosla, Benchmark, DAG Ventures and unnamed additional existing backers.
Jon Prideaux, Boku’s CEO, told TechCrunch: “There comes a time in every company’s cap table where successive private rounds lead to more complication and it is just easier to get to a situation where all shares are changed to single class and the balance sheet becomes clean again.”