Spanish-language broadcaster Univision today filed to raise $100 million in its initial public offering, although that’s almost certainly a placeholder that will eventually be replaced with a much higher dollar figure.
The moves comes just as Univision is in the midst of a giant PR battle with presidential candidate Donald Trump, over what the company referred to as Trump’s “insulting remarks about Mexican immigrants.” After Univision broke off its business partnership with Trump — including the Miss USA pageant, which Univision had been slated to air — Trump fired back by suing Univision for more than $500 million, alleging both breach of contract and defamation.
From today’s IPO filing, however, it appears that Univision doesn’t take Trump’s legal action too seriously. Here is what it says under a section titled Legal Proceedings (emphasis added):
We are subject to various lawsuits and other claims in the normal course of business. In addition, from time to time, we receive communications from government or regulatory agencies concerning investigations or allegations of noncompliance with law or regulations in jurisdictions in which we operate. We are not involved in any legal proceedings that would reasonably be expected to have a material effect on our business, financial condition or results of operations.
Ouch! Perhaps Trump could add that to his defamation claims…
As for the actual business at hand, Univision said that it will list its shares on either the NASDAQ or NYSE under ticker symbol UVN, with Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank serving as lead underwriters. It reported just under $1 million of net income on around $2.9 billion in revenue for 2014, compared to $216 million of net income on $2.6 billion in revenue for the prior year.
The New York-based company was acquired in early 2007 by a private equity consortium that included Madison Dearborn Partners, Providence Equity Partners, TPG Capital and Thomas H. Lee Partners. Also participating were the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and AlpInvest(now owned by The Carlyle Group).
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