Rakon IPO closes over-subscribed; listing May 16

Rakon Limited confirms that its initial public offer of 41,250,000 ordinary shares, valued at $66 million, successfully closed today (Friday, 12 May 2006). The issue was many times oversubscribed.

Applicants participating in the IPO will be sent notices of allocation on Monday 15 May.

Rakon’s Managing Director, Brent Robinson, said “Rakon is extremely pleased with the level of interest in the IPO. More than 1,800 investors have applied for shares including a significant number of staff”.

On listing Rakon will have approximately 39% of its shares held by new institutional and retail investors and employees of Rakon, with the remaining 61% owned by shareholders that were on Rakon’s share register prior to listing.

The issue price of NZ$1.60 per share was set in line with demand from international and domestic institutions and domestic retail brokers. At $1.60 per share Rakon will have a market capitalisation of approximately $170 million.

Mr Robinson said proceeds from the IPO were intended to fund further growth through new product development, investment in new manufacturing equipment and factory expansion.

UBS New Zealand Limited acted as Lead Manager for the IPO, and Jonathan Oram, director capital markets, said the high level of interest in Rakon was a strong endorsement of the company, providing an opportunity for local investors to share in the growth of a home-grown technology company with a true global footprint. "Rakon’s IPO demonstrates that the New Zealand capital markets are capable of valuing high growth companies," he said.

Rakon designs and manufactures high performance crystals and oscillators and currently supplies to over half of all GPS products manufactured world-wide.

All GPS receivers use quartz crystals in the decoding of satellite positioning data by oscillating at very specific frequencies and Rakon was the first to develop temperature controlled crystal oscillators that were small, inexpensive and precise enough under the dynamic temperature changes that GPS systems experience.

Rakon’s shares are due to be quoted on NZSX under the issuer code “RAK” on Tuesday, 16 May 2006.

ENDS

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