Danish business services firm ISS has revived plans to float its shares on the Nasdaq OMX Copenhagen market with an initial public share offer (IPO) which it hopes will raise 8 billion Danish crowns ($1.5 billion) for the company.
"The intended IPO is expected to support our operational strategy," Chief Executive Jeff Gravenhorst said in the statement.
By raising $1.47 billion the IPO will be the second biggest in the Nordics since Norwegian Gjensidige Forsikring raised $1.87 billion.
Private equity company EQT and Goldman Sachs bought the company for 22.1 billion Danish crowns ($4.05 billion) and delisted it from the Copenhagen bourse in 2005.
A partial sell-down of their shares is also expected under the IPO.
Previous plans to list ISS in 2007 and 2011 were dropped because of difficult market conditions.
An agreed 5.2 billion-pound ($8.69 billion) cash and shares bid by British counterpart G4S was then abandoned in November 2011 due to resistance from G4S's shareholders. At the time the deal had valued the company at 130 Danish crowns a share.
The latest IPO is expected to consist primarily of an issue of new shares and the proceeds from the offer are proposed, together with amounts drawn under a new banking facilities agreement, to repay existing credit facilities during the course of 2014.
Peers such as G4S have an enterprise value of around 10 times EBITDA according to Thomson Reuters data, a multiple that would value ISS at roughly 50 billion Danish crowns ($9.1 billion), including debt.
Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan (OTTP) and KIRKBI, which invests funds from the family behind Lego toys, bought 26 percent of ISS for 500 million euros in 2012. None of them intends to sell shares in the IPO.
Nordea, Goldman Sachs and UBS Investment Bank have been appointed to act as global coordinators and as bookrunners along with Barclays and Morgan Stanley, while Carnegie, Danske Bank and SEB have been appointed as Co-lead managers.
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