Roots Corporation, a portfolio company of Searchlight Capital Partners, has filed for an initial public offering and secondary offering.
The selling shareholders include Searchlight Capital Partners, Don Michael Investments Inc., an entity indirectly controlled by Roots founders, Michael Budman and Don Green and certain of their family members.
Searchlight Capital Partners currently owns 155,595,150 Class A Shares, which represents 79.4% of the issued and outstanding voting securities or 74.0% on a fully-diluted basis, and Don Michael Investments owns 39,148,787 Class B Shares, which represents 20.0% of the issued and outstanding voting securities or 18.6% on a fully-diluted basis.
On December 1, 2015, Searchlight Capital Partners, through Roots Corporation, acquired Roots Canada Ltd. from the founders for total consideration of $302.7 million, consisting of $263.6 million cash and the issuance of 39,148,787 Class B common shares (at a deemed price of $1.00 per share) of Roots Corporation.
Roots has applied for listing of its shares on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) under the symbol “ROOT”.
TD Securities Inc., Credit Suisse Securities (Canada), Inc. and BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. act as Joint Active Bookrunners for the offering. Jefferies Securities, Inc., RBC Dominion Securities Inc., Scotia Capital Inc., CIBC World Markets Inc., Canaccord Genuity Corp. and National Bank Financial Inc. make up the rest of the underwriting syndicate.
Torys LLP and Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP act as legal counsel to Roots and the underwriters respectively.
Established in 1973 by Michael Budman and Don Green, Roots has become an iconic Canadian brand with a rich heritage and portfolio of premium apparel, leather goods, accessories and footwear. As of July 29, 2017, Roots integrated omni-channel footprint included 116 corporate retail stores in Canada, 4 corporate retail stores in the United States, 109 partner-operated stores in Taiwan, 27 partner operated stores in China and a global e-commerce platform that shipped to 54 countries during its most recently completed fiscal year.
photo credit: Roots