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Branson-backed SPAC to raise $500 million through U.S. IPO

March 09, 2021 at 06:27 pm

(Reuters) - A blank-check firm, backed by Virgin Group's billionaire founder Richard Branson, is looking to raise as much as $500 million through an initial public offering, a regulatory filing showed on Tuesday.

Virgin Group Acquisition Corp III, a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, plans to sell 50 million units, composed of shares and warrants, priced at $10 per unit on the New York Stock Exchange. (https://bit.ly/2OEew3C)

The firm said in its filing it will be looking for targets to acquire in one of Virgin Group's core sectors, namely travel and leisure, financial services, health and wellness and renewable energy, among others.

Branson, a serial entrepreneur and a prolific investor, has raised hundreds of millions through multiple blank-check companies so far.

In February, VG Acquisition Corp, one of Branson's SPACs, agreed to take consumer DNA-testing firm 23andMe public through a merger, valuing the merged entity at $3.5 billion.

SPACs are shell companies which raise funds to acquire a private company with the intent of taking it public through a merger at a later date, allowing such companies to enter public markets by sidestepping a traditional IPO.

Credit Suisse is the sole book-running manager for the Virgin Group Acquisition Corp III offering.

(Reporting by Sohini Podder in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta)

Richard Branson

Telephony, music, finances, trains, airplanes or space exploration, the Virgin boss dares everything. A real bulimia which finds its roots in the aversion he has for the monopolies.

At sixteen, Branson creates the newspaper Students with the help of his friend Jonathan Holland Gems. Thanks to them, this newspaper becomes the mouthpiece for a generation of hippies opposed to the Vietnam War and engaged in the struggle for abortion rights.

At twenty, Richard Branson sold records by mail. Three years later he produced "Tubullar Bells" by Mike Oldfield which will be selected for the soundtrack of the movie The Exorcist. This enormous success attracts the best artists of the moment at Virgin Records as the Sex Pistols, Culture Club or Phil Collins.

Unformatted by business schools, the British businessman uses his intuition to engage in business more and more daring. Virgin Airways, Virgin Mobile to mention only the most important, show that there are no forbidden areas for the businessman the most admired of his generation. Icon in intuitive management, Richard Branson does not forget to be surrounded by the best persons in finance world as Gordon McCallum, a reference in the business world or Stephen Murphy, his Chief Financial officer and former of Unilever.

Some adventures such as cosmetics, clothing or vodka are failures but not for the businessman. When any other contractors consider these adventures as a failure, Richard Branson believes that these under achievements humanize the company and accentuate the friendly image of the boss.

Very sensitive to environmental issues, Richard Branson is hired to fight against global warming. In 2007 he gave twenty-five million dollars to reward initiatives that will be able to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

But his most ambitious project is the conquest of space. For this, he signed a contract of fifteen million pounds with an American company for the manufacture of spacecraft and partnered with Philippe Starck for VirginGalactic. The first Virgin flight in space was planned for 2009.
In fact, like Google, Richard Branson has endorsed the principle of "don’t be a evil" (do not hurt) fighting to humanely manage a business became enormous.

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Linked companies
Virgin Radio Ltd. Virgin Radio Ltd. Specialty TelecommunicationsCommunications Virgin Radio Ltd. operates as a radio station. It operates as pop and rock radio station, which provides live online latest news and music. The firm also engages in the sale of advertising time and the related operations for radio stations. The company was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in London, UK	Founder
Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd. Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd. AirlinesTransportation Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd. engages in the provision of air transportation services. It operates long haul services to various destinations including Las Vegas, Sydney, Tokyo, Delhi, Miami, and Shanghai. The company was founded by Richard Charles Nicholas Branson in 1984 and is headquartered in Crawley, the United Kingdom.	Founder

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