China-based mobile ticketing platform Maoyan Weiying expects to raise about $1bn in an initial public offering in Hong Kong that would allow several corporate investors to exit, Bloomberg reported on Friday.
The company, which is backed by internet group Tencent, online services provider Meituan-Dianping and entertainment producer Enlight Media, has begun talks with prospective advisors for the IPO, which it plans to launch later this year, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
Two of China’s most popular event ticket retail apps, Maoyan and Weiying, agreed a merger in September 2017 to form Maoyan Weiying, before Tencent invested $150m in Maoyan in November at a reported $3bn valuation.
The merged company has the largest market share of China’s mobile ticketing sector, which is responsible for the sale of about 80% of cinema tickets in the country according to Bloomberg.
Maoyan was formed by group buying service Meituan prior to its merger with local listings platform Dianping, and it was spun out in April 2016. Enlight Media agreed to pay $384m for a reported 57.4% stake the following month.
Weiying had raised at least $1.03bn in funding by itself, with Tencent, property development conglomerate Dalian Wanda and trading group Shanghai Gangtai having been investors since its $105m series B round in 2015.
Weiying’s other pre-merger backers include mobile game publisher iDreamSky, GGV Capital, Beijing Cultural Assets Fund, CMC Holdings, Ocean Capital Group, China Everbright, Wenzi Huasha, Shandong Luxin Investment Holdings and eCapital.
The merger agreement gave Enlight a 50.8% in the company prior to the investment by Tencent, which held 5.6%. Weiying had a 27.6% share while Meituan Dianping owned about 8.5%.