China's Ximalaya, Qiniu file for U.S. IPOs

(Reuters) -Ximalaya, backed by China’s Tencent Holdings, filed for an initial public offering (IPO) in the United States on Friday, cashing in on growing demand as more people tune in to podcasts while staying at home during the pandemic.

China’s Qiniu Ltd, a cloud-based platform-as-a-service provider backed by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, also filed paperwork for a U.S. IPO.

The largest online audio platform in China, Ximalaya had 250 million average monthly average users in the first quarter of 2021, according to a regulatory filing.

Ximalaya, which provides a platform for users to access free or paid content from professional or amateur providers, was valued at $3.71 billion as of July 2018, according to PitchBook. It has raised $225 million in funds from investors including General Atlantic and Tencent.

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Founded in 2012, Ximalaya’s revenue increased by more than 48% from a year earlier to around 4 billion yuan ($617.95 million) in 2020.

Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley , BofA Securities and CICC are underwriters on Ximalaya’s offering.

Qiniu and Ximalaya did not disclose any other details about their listing plans on Friday.

($1 = 6.4730 Chinese yuan renminbi)

(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain and Sohini Podder in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath)

This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed.