Sophos Wants To Raise £65m With London IPO

Security vendor Sophos is looking to raise £65 million with a float on the London Stock Exchange, targeting a total value of £1 billion.

If it goes ahead, the flotation will one of the biggest in UK tech history and will help the 30-year-old firm shake off some of its debt.

Previous attempts

The company has unsuccessfully attempted to float on the stock market on several occasions. Plans were scuppered once in 2007 due to the financial crisis, and once again in 2009 where the firm instead decided to sell a majority stake to Apax.

Sophos reported sales of $476 million (£310m) for its financial year ending March, a 22 percent boost from the previous year.

Net debt was at $318 million (£208m) at the end of April. The firm thinks it should be targeting small and medium businesses with its security products, differentiating itself from rivals such as McAfee.

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