Swedish oat milk producer Oatly has a market cap of US$10 billion after its initial public offering raised US$1.4 billion this week. The group issued 84.4 million American depository shares to US investors at US$17 per share, which rose 18.8 per cent before settling at around US$20.20.
Oatly makes alternatives to dairy milks, ice cream, yogurt, cooking creams, and spreads and exports to more than 20 countries. It sold US$421.4 million worth of products in those countries in 2020, a 106 per cent increase on 2019.
The Australian alternative milk market as a whole grew 48 per cent (132 million litres) in the last four years. There are few Australian made oat milks on the market, with Western Australia’s Wide Open Agriculture’s Dirty Clean Food OatUp brand being the only one to have achieved carbon neutral certification from the federal government’s Climate Active program.
In 2020, Oatly doubled its revenue to $420 million with an operating lost of around US$50 million. According to Forbes, the company earns more than US$100 million of its revenue from the US. Its single largest shareholder is a joint venture between Verlinvest - the family office for one of the Belgian families behind AB-InBev - and the Chinese Government. The JV holds a 46 per cent stake, which is worth US$5 billion, Forbes said. Blackstone is the second largest investor with 6.7 per cent.
Oatly CEO Toni Petersson said: “2020 was a tough year for everybody. We produced more than planned. We generated triple-digit growth successfully across three continents, without seeing each other. It just speaks about how solid our structure and our business is.
“We don’t really know what the demand is. Our growth is 100 per cent related on velocity - organic demand and velocity. We're not pushing through promotions or price mechanisms or anything like that. So we are clearly changing the game of the whole industry here.”
Following the IPO, Petersson said the funds would go towards growth. It currently has four operating plants worldwide, with five more under construction and three expansions planned. He said regional innovation, production and creativity will be the company’s focus.
Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan and Credit Suisse are the underwriters.
