SenseTime makes itself small for IPO

SenseTime makes itself small for IPO

Hong Kong, Dec. 8, 2021

AI giant SenseTime has scaled back its Hong Kong IPO to $768 million from an original cap of $2 billion amid ongoing regulatory challenges. The facial recognition company plans to sell 1.5 billion shares at HK$3.85 to HK$3.99 each to raise up to HK$5.99 billion, according to a term sheet.

The shares are to be priced on Dec. 10 and begin trading on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on Dec. 17. The offering is now backed by at least nine so-called cornerstone investors, including China’s Mixed-Ownership Reform Fund and Shanghai AI Fund, which together will acquire ~60% of the shares.

SenseTime, China’s largest AI company, plans to use most of the funds for research and development of its AI technologies, which include facial recognition and computer vision.

Founded in 2014 by professors at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, the company provides technology for use cases such as smart cities and cars, augmented reality, medical imaging and facial recognition. According to SenseTime, its software platform is used by more than 250 Fortune 500 companies.