Meituan-Dianping to File Hong Kong IPO This Week

Meituan-Dianping, China’s largest group discount platform and on-demand online services provider, is set to submit an initial public offering application to the Hong Kong stock exchange Friday, two sources close to the matter told Caixin.

The size and price of Meituan’s IPO is unknown. But it is expected to be another blockbuster listing in Hong Kong by a rising Chinese tech giant, following smartphone-maker Xiaomi Corp., which is expected to raise about $10 billion in Hong Kong and on the mainland in early July.

Meituan was valued at $30 billion in its latest funding round in October, in which the company raised $4 billion from investors led by social media giant Tencent Holdings.

Meituan hired Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, and China Renaissance as its IPO underwriters, the sources said.

Bloomberg reported last week that Meituan may raise $6 billion in the IPO and target a valuation of roughly $60 billion.

The company declined to comment.

Launched in 2010 as a Groupon-like buying site, Meituan has survived the cut-throat competition in China’s online-to-offline services market and merged with archrival Dianping in 2015 to form an industry behemoth. The company has stepped up expansion of its business reach to restaurant reservations, online tourism services, group buying, ticket booking, food delivery and car hailing.

According to CEO Wang Xing, Meituan’s 2017 revenue exceeded 33 billion yuan ($5 billion) with gross merchandise value of more than 360 billion yuan. Its platforms host 310 million active customers and 4.4 million merchants, Wang said in February.

In 2017, Meituan had 42% of China’s online food delivery market, ranking behind only Alibaba Group-backed Ele.me, according to the market data and research firm Analysys.

In February last year, Meituan launched its first car-hailing service in Nanjing, entering the fast-growing market and challenging industry behemoth Didi Chuxing. In December, Meituan said it planned to expand its car-hailing service to seven Chinese cities including Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou.

In April this year, Meituan acquired China’s leading bike-sharing startup Mobike in a deal that valued Mobike at $2.7 billion, marking a foray into a niche of the public transport market.

Meituan has also invested in foreign rivals including Indonesian giant Go-Jek and India’s Swiggy.

Contact reporter Han Wei (weihan@caixin.com)