[THE INVESTOR] The planned initial public offering of Samsung BioLogics could value the firm at up to 10.5 trillion won (US$9.34 billion), exceeding the upper end of the price band, a local securities company said on Oct. 19.
“Given that the market for biopharma contract manufacturing organizations is rapidly growing and its first and second plants have won sufficient orders until 2022, Samsung BioLogics will be able to reach the upper end of the price range,” said Kim Tae-hee, an analyst at Hyundai Securities.

Samsung Group’s biologic-drug-manufacturing arm, which is 47.8%-owned by Samsung Electronics, plans to sell 16.5 million shares priced at between 113,000 won and 136,000 won apiece, raising 1.8 trillion won to 2.3 trillion won and valuing the company at as much as 9 trillion won.

Once BioLogic’s third plant begins operation in 2018, the company expects to become the world’s largest biologics contract manufacturing organization with a total production capacity of 360,000 liters. The analyst said the firm will retain its competitive edge in capacity over its global peers due to massive investment in facilities.

BioLogics said 780 billion won of the proceeds will be used for factory investment, while another 400 billion won will be invested in its subsidiary Samsung Bioepis.

By Park Han-na (hnpark@heraldcorp.com)