Beyond Meat Looking To Raise $183.8M From IPO

Plant-based meat maker Beyond Meat is looking to raise up to $183.8 million from an initial public offering (IPO).

According to Reuters, the company’s latest filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) revealed that it is prepared to offer 8.75 million shares, priced between $19 and $21 per share. The higher end of the range would give the company a market value of $1.21 billion, based on 57.4 million outstanding shares, excluding the underwriters’ option.

Los Angeles-based Beyond Meat aims to take advantage of the growing popularity of plant-based substitutes. The company, with investors that include Tyson Foods, actor Leonardo DiCaprio and Microsoft Founder Bill Gates, announced in early January that it would offer its burger at the fast-food chain Carl’s Jr.

Beyond Meat expects to receive gross proceeds of about $175 million from the IPO (excluding the underwriters’ option). Existing stockholders won’t sell any shares in the offering, which counts Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Credit Suisse as its lead underwriters.

The company plans to use most of the proceeds toward research and development, and to build out manufacturing facilities.

Beyond Market isn’t the only plant-based meat company seeing success. Don Lee Farms, a family-run, California-based food company, has seen its bleeding veggie burgers sell out at mass-market vendors like Costco, Walmart, Whole Foods, Wegmans and Stop & Shop nationwide. Since the product launched in the market in February of 2018, more than a million burgers sold within 60 days, making it the fastest growing product in its category.

Now, a little under a year after the launch, Don Lee is gearing up for global expansion.

“We’ve seen remarkable demand for this product in the United States, far beyond what our initial expectations were,” said Danny Goodman of Don Lee Farms. “The excitement around this burger has been overwhelming, and so the natural next step was to bring it to a global audience.”