Morning:
8°c
Ocado prepares for $1bn stock market flotation
8 Feb 2010Ocado took a step closer to its stock market flotation today as it appoints advisers for a shares sale that could come as early as May.
The float would value the online grocer at about £1 billion and trigger huge windfalls for the former Goldman Sachs bankers who founded it.
Goldman, UBS and JP Morgan Cazenove are seen as frontrunners to lead the float. Goldman is a shareholder, having invested alongside Ocado's founders, Jonathan Faiman, Tim Steiner and Jason Gissing.
A float could bring an exit - full or partial - of John Lewis, whose Waitrose groceries division supplies the group.
The company has had rapid increases in sales but is still to make a pre-tax profit. Last year it made a pre-tax loss of £32.6 million.
Reader views (3)
This is a business that is reliant on Waitrose and basically runs a delivery business and isn't very proftiable to boot. The margins will surely never be great, so where does the growth come from? Pension fund investors must surely avoid this - it looks to me like a cash-out for the present owners, fat fees and bonuses for the city spivs and some poor sod's pension fund with another bite taken out - think on Debenhams, Sports Direct etc etc etc
- Nick Fletcher, London, 18/03/2010 13:03
Report abuse
So how will this affect the pension scheme at John Lewis? what with the JL Pension Scheme investing money in Ocado, looks like we might have to work a bit longer to get a pension to live on!!!!!
- Liam, Dartford, 26/02/2010 16:42
Report abuse
Ocado float!? So that's why they are hoiking up their delivery charges to ridiculous levels - which has encouraged me to do my online shopping elsewhere. Potential investors have been warned...
- Nick, Battersea, 08/02/2010 13:41
Report abuse
