British greeting card firm Moonpig recently opened on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) to smash success, giving a £491 million ($672 million) exit to its initial investors in its initial public offering.

The company was valued at a staggering £1.2 billion when it was initially floated on the LSE for 350p per share. The shares closed at over 410p (about 17% above the original value) trading as high as 440-450p during the day. Moonpig aimed to raise 20 million pounds through 5.7 million new shares. Its existing 134.6 million shares (about 41% of the company) available for purchase at the time bring the offer total to about 491.2 million pounds. An additional 14 million shares are also reportedly being made available by the company considering the high investor demand. Nickyl Raithatha, the CEO of Moonpig Group was quoted as saying:

“We are confident that Moonpig Group will continue to make gifting even more effortless for millions of people across the UK and internationally. As the leaders of a market undergoing an accelerating shift to online, now is the perfect time for us to bring the company to the public market, and we are excited about Moonpig’s prospects for the future.”

J.P Morgan and Citigroup acted as the joint global coordinators and bookrunners for the deal, which was London’s second biggest listing of the year at the time (the biggest being Dr Martens’ IPO with a valuation of nearly £4 billion).

About Moonpig

Moonpig was founded in the year 2000 by Nick Jenkins, a former commodities trader and star of the popular TV show “Dragon’s Den”, the British counterpart to America’s Shark Tank. It split from its long-time subsidiary Photobox (an online photo printing and personalised gifts company in 2019). The company opted for a change in leadership in 2019, bringing in seasoned industry professionals in the form of Chief Executive Officer Nickyl Raithatha and Chairwoman Kate Swann. Swann has previously worked as the CEO of WH Smith and SSP group while Raithatha had previously been an employee of the banking giant Goldman Sachs and German startup factory Rocket Internet.

According to the company’s IPO prospectus, Moonpig’s sales were up more than 135% within the six months leading to October 2020. It held about 60% of the market share in the U.K among companies that sold most of their cards online and a 65% share among the top three card vendors in the Netherlands. The company is currently eyeing a spot in the coveted FTSE top 250 with this IPO. Oliver Brown, fund manager at RC Brown, in his praise of Moonpig stated:

“It’s remarkable to see a listing by a company that owns this much market share. They effectively created the segment.”

In sum

The rampant spread of coronavirus throughout the U.K led to stringent lockdown restrictions being applied in the country throughout the past year. This has caused a major increase in sales with more people choosing to have cards and presents delivered online than ever before.

As a result, market leaders such as Moonpig have seen an unprecedented rise in revenue, thereby giving them the confidence to go for a public listing. With this, Moonpig has joined the elite list of British tech unicorns that are being dubbed as the holy grail of the U.K. economy in 2021. The U.K saw the emergence of more than 7 tech unicorns in 2020 alone, which brings its tally to just above twice those of Germany and France. With delivery firm Deliveroo in the picture too now, experts are viewing this as the start of a “golden year” for tech in the U.K. Stephen Kelly, the Chair of Tech Nation stated:

“The announcement today that Moonpig has listed on the London Stock Exchange is yet another sign that we are entering a golden year for UK tech. The IPO of a homegrown company demonstrates both the strength of talent in the UK and the appeal of the LSE as a location for companies looking to IPO.”

On the Exchequer and Finance minister Rishi Sunak’s recommendation, the British Treasury is also conducting a review to essentially change the listing rules in the U.K. After P.M Johnson’s hard Brexit, this is being seen as a major move that could entice more tech unicorns to list in the country.