Beauty tech firm APR aims for first IPO of 2024

Actress Kim Hee-sun, who's a model for APR's AGE-R beauty device, holds the product in this promotional image / Courtesy of APR

Global beauty tech company APR has kicked off an official procedure toward its initial public offering (IPO), targeting to be the first IPO of 2024.

The company submitted a securities registration statement to the Korea Exchange (KRX), the bourse operator of the Korean stock market, last Friday, stating that it plans to publicly offer 379,000 shares — a combination of 309,000 newly issued shares (81.53 percent) and 70,000 shares from existing shareholders (18.47 percent).

Given that the expected offering price of the shares is between 147,000 won ($112) and 200,000 won, APR's market cap is estimated to reach 1.5 trillion won with a successful IPO. The company's corporate valuation at the pre-IPO round in March exceeded 700 billion won, and went on to surpass the 1 trillion won mark during June's investment round by CJ Onstyle.

With Shinhan Securities and Hana Securities leading the underwriting procedures, the bookbuilding process to receive demands from institutional investors is slated to open from Jan. 22 to 26, followed by a subscription period for retail investors on Feb. 1 and 2. If APR successfully completes the process as planned, it will be the first company of the year to debut on the country's main benchmark KOSPI market.

APR CEO Kim Byung-hoon poses in front of a promotional image for the firm's beauty products at its headquarters in Lotte World Tower in Seoul, Sept. 15. Korea Times photo by Choi Won-suk

Founded in 2014 by current CEO Kim Byung-hoon, APR's scope of business is broad, ranging from cosmetics brand April Skin, beauty device brand Medicube and nutritions brand Glam.D to fashion clothes brand Nerdy. The company also runs Photogray, a photo booth brand.

Riding the increasing global popularity of K-dramas and K-beauty products, the company's global earnings are on a continual rise. For instance, the number of cumulative sales of Medicube's AGE-R beauty device product both in and outside of Korea has exceeded over 1.5 million, as of mid-November.

Based on such solid growth, the company's aggregated earnings have been increasing. During the first three quarters of the year, the company posted a cumulative revenue of 378.1 billion won with operating profit of 69.2 billion won, year-on-year increases of 37.9 percent and 277.6 percent, respectively.