The oat milk brand, which has filed for a $100m offering in the US, traces its origins back to Lund University in the 1990s.

Oatly, a Sweden-based oat milk producer based on research at Lund University, filed on Monday to raise up to $100m in a US initial public offering. Founded in 1994, Oatly’s oat milk is sold across some 60,000 retail outlets and in more than 32,000 coffee shops across more than 20 countries, in addition to its online platform. Its formula was developed by a group of scientists at Lund University in the 1990s. It more than doubled revenue to $421m in 2020, though its net loss rose from $35.6m to $60.4m. The IPO follows a $200m round in July 2020 led by investment manager Blackstone and backed by entertainment agency Roc Nation and Rabo Corporate Investments, a strategic investment vehicle for agriculture-focused financial services firm Rabobank. Oatly co-founders Rickard and Björn Öste also participated in the July round, as did growth equity firm Orkila Capital and assorted private investors. The company had reportedly raised about $41m from unnamed investors in October 2019, three years after Chinese state-owned conglomerate China Resources, Verlinvest and Strand Equity invested an undisclosed amount. Its backers also include Oyster Bay Venture Capital. Verlinvest is Oatly’s largest shareholder, the owner of nearly 10.8 million shares, while Blackstone vehicle BXG Redhawk holds 1.46 million and Öste Ventures 976,000 on behalf of the two co-founders. The offering is set to take place on the Nasdaq Global Select Market and the underwriters include Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Securities, Credit Suisse Securities (USA), Barclays Capital, Jefferies, BNP Paribas Securities Corp, BofA Securities and Piper Sandler. The underwriter list is filled out by RBC Capital Markets, Rabo Securities USA, William Blair & Company, Guggenheim Securities, Truist Securities, China International Capital Corporation Hong Kong Securities, Nordea Bank, Oppenheimer and SEB Securities. – A version of this article first appeared on our sister site, Global Corporate Venturing. Feature image courtesy of Oatly.

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