Beyond Meat Inc., the other maker of analogue meats, is in final preparations for an initial public offering of stock, hoping to raise as much as $184 million as it joins Nasdaq Global Market under the symbol BYND.
Several media were reporting the company plans to sell 8.75 million shares for $19-21 each, according to a filing April 22 with the Securities and Exchange Commission. A listing at the top of that range would give the company a market value of about $1.2 billion based on the shares to be outstanding after the offer, according Bloomberg News, which cited the filing.
No date for the launch was mentioned, but the initial SEC filing actually was back in November of last year and apparently must be exercised by about May 13.
The company said in its filing its revenues have grown from $16.2 million in 2016 to $32.6 million in 2017 to $87.9 million in 2018, representing a 133% compound annual growth rate. But it's also sustained losses in those years: $25.1 million in 2016, $30.4 million in 2017 and $29.9 million last year.
Beyond Meat's investors include Bill Gates, actor Leonardo DiCaprio, former McDonald’s Corp. CEO Don Thompson, as well as Tyson Foods. The company's biggest stakeholders are venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers LLC, which owns 16 percent of the company, and Twitter Inc. co-founder Ev William’s Obvious Ventures with 9 percent, according to its filings.
Beyond Meat makes substitute ground meat and sausage, having abandoned its original effort at a chicken substitute. Its burger, the Beyond Burger, is available in TGIFridays, Carl's Jr. and A&W plus many foodservice points. It competes with Impossible Foods' Impossible Burger, which recently began test marketing at Burger King restaurants.
