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VIA looks again to NYSE share listing
Out to raise $300-500m when chip market picks up
VIA is going to issue $300-500 million worth of shares on the New York Stock Exchange, the culimination of a scheme it announced some time ago but got cold feet thanks to the dotcom crash and the decline in the semiconductor market.
The chipset maker has revived its plan on the back of expectations that the global chip biz will begin to start growing again through the second half of 2001.
However, the first half has been so bad - Q2 in particular, with industry players' comments on it ranging from "very bad" to "disastrous" - that even modest growth in Q3 and Q4 will only bring the annual decline to around 14 per cent.
Still, VIA reckons, the time is right to reconsider its US listing, and it has engaged the services of Credit Suisse First Boston and others to manage the rights issue.
"The sooner we kick off the sale, the better It'll be for us to expand," said an unnamed VIA executive, according to DigiTimes.
The shares to be offered will be American Depository Receipts, and they will be offered sometime in the second half of the year.
To date, VIA's 2001 sales have totalled $480 million, around 36 per cent of its target for the year. ®
Biting the hand that feeds IT
