Pharmaceuticals distributor Protek is aiming for a valuation of up to $2.1 billion in an initial public offering in Moscow, delivering a $200 million cash windfall for founder and owner Vadim Yakunin.
The company, 96 percent owned by Yakunin, said Wednesday that it was hoping to raise $400 million in the new share placement at a price range of $3.10 to $4.50 per share, indicating a float of anything between a fifth and a third of stock.
A spokesman for the company said Yakunin was planning on taking around half the cash for himself and investing the rest in the business.
Protek, founded by Yakunin in 1990, has 22 percent of Russia's wholesale pharmaceuticals market and a 578-store chain of chemists.
"Protek intends to use the net proceeds … to finance the growth of its retail business and further develop its production operations," the company said in a statement.
Protek is one of a flurry of Russian companies seeking to go public amid still benign market conditions. It expects to complete the book-building process by the end of April.
Fertilizer giant Uralchem, seafood producer Russian Sea and Ukrainian chicken farmer Avangard have all announced IPOs in recent weeks following a barren 2009.
Protek's IPO is being run jointly by Renaissance Capital and UBS.
Yakunin, born in 1963, trained as an engineer-physicist in Moscow before founding Protek. The company got its break when it signed a partnership with Hungary's largest pharmaceutical company Richter Gedeon — still a 4 percent shareholder — to import its medicines to Russia.
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