Altice USA IPO goes quite well - pockets a cool $1.9 billion

The results are in from the Altice IPO which has caused a stir recently, and they are some good ones; the team has raised roughly $1.9 billion through the sale of around 6.5% of shares.

This is in fact the second-largest IPO of the year, behind Snap’s $3.9 billion deal, and only the second IPO of a cable company in the last five years, alongside WideOpenWest which last month raised about $310 million. Although this might seem like a good chunk of change, Altice will pocket roughly $330 million, with the rest going to investors. It does make a dent in its debt though.

Altice has been on a spending spree on both sides of the Atlantic, in fact, Alice USA was created out of the merger of the Suddenlink Communications and Cablevision acquisitions over the course of the last two years. The company now has a footprint which covers 21 states and 4.9 million customers, making it the fourth largest cable company in the country. The IPO values the business at $22 billion.

While this is certainly a good bit of business, it might not be the last time we see Altice USA in the headlines. If Altice founder Patrick Drahi’s experience is anything to go buy, you can expect to see rapid expansion in the states. Drahi has turned Altice into a European power house through acquisition-led growth, slashing costs and using scale to improve efficiencies.

Cable companies have long been harbouring ambitions of diversification, primarily because of trends moving consumers away from traditional TV, which perhaps makes you wonder where the success of this IPO came from. Why are people so excited about buying into an industry which is slowly (but definitely) dying? Perhaps the success of Drahi in the European markets is an attraction, or maybe they know something about potential acquisitions that we don’t?

In any case, Altice USA has a little bit of cash to play around with now, so don’t be surprised if there is another acquisition to write about over the next couple of months.