Ten-year-old Australian online garment printer Redbubble began trading on the ASX yesterday, reaching a high of $1.53 shortly after floating from a launch price of $1.33 before settling down to $1.45.
Through its initial public offering Redbubble sold off $30m shares, and saw an additional $9.8m from existing investors.
Its maiden float on the ASX saw a share price jump as high as 15 per cent to $1.53, and closed at $1.45. Following the e-commerce printer’s early share spike, it is now valued at $287m.
Founded 10 years ago by three friends, Martin Hosking, Paul Vanzella and Peter Styles, Redbubble is an online hub selling personalised products such as t-shirts, caps and pillowcases.
It gives independent designers the opportunity to monetise artwork by uploading the designs to the website, where the public chooses designs to have printed on various items.
Industry analysts have tipped Redbubble with potential to trade even higher than its current 1.6 times revenue, with other publically listed e-commerce businesses trading around 3.7 times revenue.
[Related: Redbubble gears up to float]
Martin Hosking describes Redbubble as being in the ‘investment;’ phase. Redbubble previous garnered a $6.3m net loss in 2015, which was expected to treble to an $18m loss in 2016, and return to another $6m loss next year.
“When we founded Redbubble 10 years ago, we were driven by a passion to help independent artists and enable them to reach new markets. Since then, Redbubble has been propelled by a wave of consumers seeking more meaningful and distinctive products and the ever-increasing possibilities of print-on-demand technologies,” says Hosking.
“Today’s listing is a milestone on a much longer journey for Redbubble. Our mission is to create the world’s largest marketplace for independent artists and we believe we are well positioned to further enhance our position and value to Redbubble artists, consumers and shareholders.”
It’s not all good news however, Redbubble is also in the throes of a legal battle after motorcycle gang Hells Angels and Japanese brand Pokémon sued the business for copyright law infringement.
According to the company, Redbubble users have illegally uploaded and sold merchandise without the brand’s permission. Hosking has defended his company and says a copyright team is working to resolve the issue.
[Related: IVE succeeds with IPO]
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