Zeekr Ready for NYSE, Valuation exceeds $13 billion

Chinese EV maker Zeekr Automotive (ZEEKR Intelligent Technology) submitted its prospectus to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) today, preparing for listing on the New York Stock Exchange with the stock symbol “ZK”.

Since the end of June 2021, when DiDi went public, Chinese stocks listing in the US have largely paused. In 2023, Quantum Song and Hesai Group have successively listed on the US stock market, which warmed up the listing of Chinese concept stocks in the US for a short while. However, since March 2023, there have been no large-scale Chinese concept stock companies listing in the US. Zeekr’s submission of an application to go public in the US therefore sends a very positive signal to Chinese concept stocks, which may reignite the enthusiasm for Chinese concept stocks to go public in the US. After a successful IPO, Zeekr will also become another Chinese new energy vehicle brand to be listed in the US after NIO, Li Auto, and Xpeng. 

Established in March 2021, Zeekr is positioned as a luxury intelligent pure electric brand under the Geely Holding Group. Starting from 2023, Zeekr will launch at least two new models every year, with a total of 8 models by 2025, aiming to achieve a sales volume of 650,000 units by 2025.

In August 2021, Zeekr received $500 million in financing, with investors including Intel, CATL, Bilibili, and Boyu Capital. In February 2023, Zeekr announced the completion of a $750 million Series A financing round, with a post-investment valuation of $13 billion. 

The prospectus shows that Zeekr’s operating profits for 2020, 2021, and 2022 were 83.1 million, -4.3 billion, and -7.15 billion (approximately $986 million) respectively; net profits were 1 billion, -4.5 billion, and -7.655 billion respectively. In the first half of 2023, Zeekr invested 3.189 billion yuan in R&D, a year-on-year increase of 56.09%, and the cumulative R&D investment from 2021 to the first half of 2023 reached 11.795 billion.

Currently, the chairman of Zeekr is Li Shufu, the founder of Geely, and An Conghui is the co-founder and CEO of the company. The other two co-founders of Zeekr are Donghui Li and Shengyue Gui. As of now, Geely Auto holds 54.7% of the shares, Geely International (Hong Kong) Limited holds 13.2%, and GHGK Innovation Limited holds 9.8%.

Geely has been pushing for its numerous assets to go public overseas in recent years. In October 2021, Volvo went for IPO on the Nasdaq Stockholm Exchange, raising approximately $2.3 billion. If the IPO goes well, Zeekr is going to be Geely’s next listed company. 

SEE ALSO: Zeekr 001 European Edition Will Soon Enter the German and French Markets