Garena, a Singapore-based mobile and internet services provider backed by internet group Tencent, plans to raise up to $1bn in a 2018 initial public offering, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday.
The IPO is set to take place in the US, according to people familiar with the matter, who told the WSJ that Garena invited representatives of various banks to Singapore this week to discuss the prospective offering.
Founded in 2009, Garena initially operated as a mobile game platform before branching out into other services such as messaging, social networking, online payment and e-commerce. It operates in Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Garena had raised a total of $500m from backers including China-based Tencent – though details of Tencent’s investment have not been revealed – as of April 2016 when Malaysian state-owned fund Khazanah Nasional led a $170m series D round that valued it at $3.75bn.
SeaTown, which invests as a subsidiary of Singaporean state-owned firm Temasek, added an undisclosed sum in September along with investment fund Global Digital Prima Venture and startup studio Mistletoe.
Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is also an investor in Garena, as is growth equity firm General Atlantic, venture capital firm Keytone Ventures and Toivo Annus, co-founder of online communication platform Skype.