NEW YORK, July 3, 2013—Duane Morris partners Lee Potter and Eberhard H. Röhm in New York recently advised Joh. A. Benckiser GmbH (JAB) in the IPO of consumer-products company Coty Inc. (NYSE: COTY). An affiliate of JAB sold 43.5 million Coty shares in the IPO. Private equity funds Rhone Capital and Berkshire Partners also sold a portion of their respective Coty shares. Total proceeds from the IPO were approximately $1 billion.
JAB owned more than 80 percent of Coty's shares prior to the offering, and it continues to hold a significant majority of the company's outstanding shares.
The company, which began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on June 12, 2013, priced 57.1 million shares at $17.50 per share. The IPO consisted entirely of secondary sales of common stock by existing selling stockholders. J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley acted as representatives for a group of underwriters that also included Barclays, Deutsche Bank Securities, Wells Fargo Securities and others. The offering's size could increase to $1.15 billion if the underwriters elect to exercise their over-allotment option and purchase additional Coty shares. In the event that this option is fully exercised, the IPO would constitute the largest-ever U.S.-based offering by a consumer-products company.
Founded in Paris in 1904, Coty is a global beauty company with a portfolio of well-known fragrance, cosmetics, and skin and body care brands. Its portfolio includes adidas, Calvin Klein, Chloé, Davidoff, Marc Jacobs, OPI, philosophy, Playboy, Rimmel and Sally Hansen. The company competes in more than 130 countries and territories. Coty's final prospectus for the offering is available on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission website: http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1024305/000093041313003422/c72993_424b4.htm.
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