NEW YORK — SFX Entertainment, the company that media executive Robert Sillerman formed in June 2012, is looking to raise up to $175 million through an IPO, according to reports. SFX Entertainment filed an S-1 form with the SEC on June 25.
In its most recent incarnation, SFX Entertainment has been investing in EDM-related entities including Disco Donnie Presents, ID&T and Beatport. The IPO would give the company a way to gain a bigger share of the estimated $4.5 million global market in EDM music.
UBS Investment Bank, Barclays and Jefferies are the proposed underwriters for the IPO, according to the prospectus, which also detailed some of SFX’s results for last year including revenues (a combined $242 million), earnings (a net loss of $47.9 million) and debt ($64.5 million).
SFX Entertainment has also applied to Nasdaq to trade publically with the symbol, SFXE.
Observers noted parallels between SFX Entertainment and the previous incarnation of SFX Entertainment that Sillerman expanded in the 1990s before selling to Clear Channel for $4.4 billion in 2000. It was spun off in 2005 as Live Nation.
Live Nation, meanwhile, has also been investing in EDM-related properties, including a stake in Insomniac Events, organizers of the Electric Daisy Carnivals. While no firm details of a transaction were disclosed, media estimates put Live Nation’s investment in the $50 to $80 million range.
Along with a majority stake in ID&T, the company behind the Tomorrowland festival in Belgium and Sensation events around the world, SFX Entertainment now owns MMG Nightlife, a nightclub operator in south Florida, and outlined plans to acquire Made Event, organizers of the Electric Zoo festival in New York.
