Africanhair PLC, trading as BeautyClick, a leading beauty e-commerce company has revealed plans to raise equity by listing at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE). Founded in 2016 by Danish investors, BeautyClick is a pioneering e-commerce company retailing in beauty products.
The company, incorporated in Kenya, is a wholly owned subsidiary of ClickBeauty International based in Denmark.
Africanhair PLC’s shareholders recently approved its quest to raise new equity to bolster the commercialisation of its beauty products portfolio, enhancing its technology-backed e-commerce platform and accelerating growth both in Kenya and the region. The approval included a directive to immediately start the listing process.
Speaking on the shareholders’ consent for an NSE listing, the company’s founder, and director, Mr Jesper Drescher, said the shareholders’ unanimous decision sets the pace for the company to invite the public to buy into it as it seeks further capitalization to bolster is growth plan.
“Upon receiving the greenlight from our shareholders, we kickstarted the process to seek requisite regulatory approvals for listing and further capitalization at the Nairobi Securities Exchange. To this end, we have appointed a team of experienced transaction advisors to provide the appropriate guidance on the process,” said Mr. Drescher.
Africanhair PLC has appointed Standard Investment Bank as the lead Transaction Advisor. CDSC Registrars Limited will act as the receiving agent and data processing consultant while Cooperative Bank will be the receiving bank. Hill +Knowlton Strategies will be the Communication Consultants. Other Advisors include JP Advocates LLP as the Legal Advisors; Kirenge and Associates as the reporting accountants.
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The NSE has lately been struggling to attract quality listings of the type that excited investors in the 2005-2011 period such as Safaricom, KenGen and AccessKenya. Recent listings have consisted of small firms in the growth and enterprise segment, while a number of medium-sized firms have been delisting from the bourse.
BeautyClick listing is not expected to arouse so much emotions on the NSE but it is a welcome development for the NSE nonetheless.
Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) has seen the number of listed companies fall after seven were either suspended or delisted in recent years. National Bank of Kenya, Kenya Airways, Deacons East Africa, Athi River Cement and Kenol Kobil are some of the companies that are no-longer active on the exchange for various reasons.
Lack of interest in listing by private companies is a challenge that NSE and Capital Markets Authority (CMA) have had to contend with for long. In 2013, NSE launched the Growth Enterprise Market Segment (GEMS) to attract small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and enable them to raise operating capital, while benefiting from increased profile and liquidity.
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The initiative, however, has only managed to attract five firms since then, compared to an annual projection of at least three companies. These are Atlas, Flame Tree, Home Afrika, Kurwitu, and Nairobi Business Ventures.
In 2017, the bourse introduced the Exchange Traded Fund whose counters have had little activity. However, they have been unable to sustain growth with some of them such as Atlas drowning while Kurwitu has posted losses year-after-year. Property developer, Home Africa’s share price remains a source of pain for its founders and investors.
