Virgin Mobile plans IPO of up to $467.5 million
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Virgin Mobile USA Inc, a venture of Sprint Nextel Corp  and Virgin Group , filed on Tuesday for an initial public offering of up to $467.5 million to raise money to repay debt and for general purposes.
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Virgin Group will try to win  over shareholders with a sweetened bid for Northern Rock on the  eve of a speech by the British Chancellor to Parliament about  the struggling UK bank, an unsourced Sunday Times report said.
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When Virgin Group VA.UL Chairman  Richard Branson put his brand on a U.S. mobile telephone  service two years ago, there appeared to be scant space for  newcomers to the crowded market.
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Richard Branson&#39;s mobile phone group, which was listed in July, said first-half margins would be well ahead of last year and it expected capital expenditure, as a percentage of revenue, to be below 4pc in the first half and at a similar level for the full
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LONDON, September 27  - Virgin Group Limited, owned by the British billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson, is planning to launch the world&#39;s first passenger flight service to space in 2007, with seat prices starting at about $198,600.
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(InfoWorld) - Though business demand for IT products remains moderate, IPOs point to a healthy sector that is instilling confidence among investors. But IT is not back to the days of the bubble. Gone are the days when companies issue IPOs on promises alone. "You need real products and services, tangible results," said Eric Gebaide, managing director of Innovation Advisors, an investment banking firm. Companies generally need about $50 million in revenue before going public, he said. The IPO market is better now than it has been for years, and IT has nabbed a good share of investor funds, according to an IPO survey issued this week by Thomson Financial and the National Venture Capital Association. In May, there were 11 IPOs in the U.S., more than for any month since October 2004. For the first five months of the year, the number of IPOs, and their dollar amount, hit their highest level since 2000, right before the dot-com bubble burst. Of the 33 IPOs so far this year, and the $5.1 billion they raised, IT's share lagged behind medical, health, and life sciences. But the biggest IPO was for a wireless communications company, MetroPCS Communications, with an offering that raised an initial $1.15 billion. Also, average performance for IPO companies so far this year is strongest in IT, where companies have realized a 13.9 percent increase from offer price to close, according to IPO survey. Medical, health, and life sciences IPO companies realized a 2.2 percent increase, and non-high tech sectors registered a 6.6 percent increase. Valuations are also up in general, to $156.7 million per IPO for the year so far, an all-time record. "Revenue growth and profitability are driving valuations up," said Gebaide. For IT, investors have seen eight to 10 quarters of solid revenue, he noted. Companies are more confident about financial forecasts, which also boosts confidence in tech, he said. An example this week was Texas Instruments's midquarter forecast Tuesday. It said second-quarter earnings would be $0.40 to $0.44 a share, compared with its prior estimate of $0.39 cents to $0.45 cents a share. Though the upper end of the forecast was pulled down, the midpoint of the forecast still aligns to the $0.42 per share predicted by analysts polled by Thomson Financial. The TI shares slipped on the news, but the major brokerages, which forecast good profit margins and strong product cycles for the company, reiterated their positive ratings on the company. All of this is happening in a market where corporate IT spending remains moderate. A recentÂ ChangeWave Research poll, for example, reported that the percentage of companies planning to increase their spending on technology has fallen to its lowest point in the last four years. But demand among consumers and interest in certain technologies is strong. For example, IDC this week raised its 2007 PC industry forecast. Vendors will ship 256.7 million units in 2007, a 12.2 percent increase from the previous year, it said. IDC had previously forecast a growth rate of 11.1 percent. Consumers were attracted by low prices on notebooks, Microsoft's Vista, and the new generation of dual-core chips, IDC said. For their part, venture capitalists are generally interested in Web 2.0, e-commerce, mobile communications and security technology, Innovation Advisors' Gebaide said.ADVERTISEMENTIBM Information On Demand 2006Industrial Industry Leaders, please join us at IBM's premier information management global event, IBM Information On Demand 2006, October 15-20, Anaheim, CA. More IBM business and technical solutions content in one place than ever before! Select from  over 800 sessions. Register today!
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Virgin Mobile Holdings PLC reported an 18 percent surge in revenue but lower net profits for the half year Thursday as the costs of its listing on the London Stock Exchange this summer hurt the bottom line.
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AS SUSPECTED, VIRGIN DIGITAL is to be launched today and Sir Richard Branson, the overseer of the Virgin group, said it will include over a million tracks and compatibility with 50 plus portable gizmos.
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British billionaire Richard Branson of Virgin Group is touted to be taking a stake in Malaysia&#39;s new AirAsia long-haul budget airline, the Star newspaper reported.
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Singapore Technologies Telemedia and Telekom Malaysia are paying US$390m-equivalent to acquire a 48 per cent stake in Idea Cellular, India&#39;s fifth-largest mobile operator, after conducting due
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Australia's Virgin Blue Holdings Ltd.   said on Tuesday it was close to signing an order for  new Boeing  planes worth up to US$2.6 billion ahead of  the launch of long-haul flights to the United States next year.
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Virgin Mobile is in talks with several Chinese mobile operators about starting operations in the country. Richard Branson&#39;s mobile arm works with carriers as a Virtual Mobile Operator - it provides the marketing
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Private equity group Carlyle is poised  to launch an $8 billion bid for Britain&#39;s Virgin Media  , the cable company whose largest shareholder is  Richard Branson, the Sunday Telegraph newspaper said, citing  City sources.
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BARCELONA/MUMBAI  - Britain's Vodafone Group Plc  has won the battle for a controlling stake in Hutchison Essar with a bid that values India's fourth-biggest mobile firm at around $19 billion, including debt.
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October launch for Lobster 700TV handset Virgin has announced an October launch for its Lobster 700TV handset, which can receive video and radio over the Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) network.â¦
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LONDON, February 27  /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- In this morning's edition of the Daily Telegraph BSkyB claims to have offered Virgin Media significant concessions and a new annual price of 90 pence per subscriber, or GBP32.4 million, for carriage of its basic channels on Virgin Media's network.
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Celtel, a pan-African mobile phone operator, is to float on the London Stock Exchange early next year in a move that will value the stake of Mohamed Ibrahim, a former technical director of BT Cellnet and founder of the mobile group, at up to &pound;275m (&#36;496m).