UAE’s Borouge to launch IPO; eyes Abu Dhabi listing in early June

SINGAPORE (ICIS)–UAE-based polyolefins producer Borouge on Wednesday said that it is planning to launch an initial public offering (IPO) and list on the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange (ADX) by early June this year.

The IPO will consist of around 3bn ordinary shares, representing 10% of Borouge’s shares held by Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) and Austria-based producer Borealis.

The subscription period for the UAE retail offering will be from 23-28 May, while that for qualified investors will be from 23-30 May. The shares are expected to be admitted for trading on the ADX on 3 June.

Borouge is a joint venture between ADNOC and Borealis. Post-IPO, ADNOC will have a 54% stake in Borouge, while Borealis’ stake will be 36%.

Its production capacity currently stands at around 2.7m tonnes/year of polyethylene (PE) and 2.2m tonnes/year of polypropylene (PP), according to the company.

In the first quarter of 2022, the company started up its fifth 480,000 tonne/year PP unit at its Ruwais site.

The fifth PP unit boosted Borouge’s overall polyolefins production capacity to 5m tonnes/year.

Development of the company’s phase four project at the Ruwais complex is underway.

The $6.2bn Borouge 4 project is expected to be completed in 2025 and will boost the site’s polymers capacity to 6.4m tonnes/year.

Borouge’s sales volumes from its consumer solutions and infrastructure solutions units totaled 2.5m tonnes/year and 1.7m tonnes/year in 2021.

The company’s polymer products were mainly sold in Asia, representing about 59% of total sales volumes, as well as the Middle East and Africa – which, combined, accounted for around 33% of overall sales volumes.

“Global polyolefins demand in Borouge’s markets is forecasted to account for approximately 86% of global polyolefin demand growth between 2022 and 2026, resulting in a forecasted 1.2x GDP growth in consumer solutions and approximately 1.4x GDP growth in infrastructure solutions,” the company said.

(adds details throughout)