Intel’s Mobileye jumps nearly 38% after target-topping IPO
Shares of Mobileye Global Inc. rose by nearly 38% in its return to Wall Street on Wednesday after raising $861 million in an initial public offering that topped its price targets.
In one of the biggest IPOs of the year, Intel Corp.’s self-driving technology unit sold 41 million shares at $21 a piece. Mobileye shares rose as high as $29.85 a piece in before closing at $28.907 on Wednesday.
The Israel-based company’s market capitalization at the end of the day was about $23 billion. While that is more than the $15.3 billion Intel paid for the business in 2017, it is much lower than anticipated earlier this year.
Market observers in the spring forecast the company could be valued as high as $50 billion in the offering. Valuation expectations fell to $30 billion by the end of the summer. When Mobileye set its price range last week, it forecast that it would valued at between $14 billion and $16 billion.
At a conference Monday night, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger attempted to play down expectations for Mobileye’s offering, saying that Intel was taking it public, because it was time for the company to be public, not because Mobileye needed to raise money, Reuters reported.
Going public “is the best way to maximize the company’s potential,” Gelsinger said, according to Reuters.
In conjunction with the offering, Intel has arranged for a separate $100 million private placement investment for the company. The chip giant is retaining control of Mobileye; it only sold 5% of the company’s shares in the offering.
Mobileye rang the opening bell Wednesday morning on the Nasdaq exchange, where it is trading with the symbol of MBLY. That’s the same ticker it used when it was previously a public company.
The company went public amid a drought in Bay Area IPOs. Not a single local tech company has hit Wall Street through through an IPO that raised at least $50 million since late January, when San Jose’s Credo Technology Holding Group Ltd. went public.