Maas revives IPO plans

Maas Group is headquartered in Dubbo in the central west of NSW. Picture: Supplied.

NSW-based construction materials, equipment and services company Maas Group is reviving plans for its initial public offering.

The company was slated for a listing through Morgans and Moelis last year, but the plans were placed on hold as the company bedded down acquisitions.

Now the group is back in front of institutional investors and private wealth networks for a series of one-on-one presentations this week, as first revealed on Thursday by DataRoom online.

The Dubbo-based company was founded by Wes Maas in 2003 and it is expected to deliver at least $60m of earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for the 2020 financial year, up 13 per cent from the previous corresponding period.

Maas Group has generated annual growth in gross revenue averaging 30 per cent since it began in 2003.

A focus of the presentations to investors this week is on the growth of the business across all of its segments and the focus on achieving high returns on capital.

The company will also promote the merits of the anticipated infrastructure spending throughout the country, particularly as the governments look to accelerate “shovel ready” projects to help the economic recovery in the aftermath of COVID-19.

Maas Group already provides products and services to major infrastructure projects including Snowy Hydro 2.0, Brisbane Cross River Rail, regional rail, WestConnex, Melbourne Metro and upgrades to the major north-south Newell Highway route.

Strategic buys

Since its 2019 IPO plans were suspended, Maas Group has invested in a number of strategic quarry positions, with its business comprising 18 quarries, and the plan is to capitalise on the Inland Rail construction project though central NSW.

It has also expanded its capabilities in the underground equipment space during 2019, buying industry leader Jacon and merging its manufacturing operations with Maas Group’s EMS business at a new expanded low-cost production facility in Vietnam.

The business unit provides mobile equipment such as shotcrete machines to the global tunnelling and underground hard rock mining sectors, which is expected to be supported by the infrastructure tunnelling and gold mining sectors.

Earlier, expectations were that Maas Group would be worth about $500m when it listed.

Mr Maas is a former South Sydney rugby league player who, according to the company’s website, started with one Bobcat and one tipper truck.

Since then he has grown the operation to one with at least 300 machines, a quarry business and a crushing and screening contract hire operation, as well as a commercial and residential property division.

The business operates throughout Australia, with a strong presence in regional areas.

It also has a growing international presence.

The listing comes as some expect other floats that were placed on hold could be heading back to the boards, with the equities market remaining buoyant despite the economic certainty surrounding COVID-19.

Another company being discussed as one that could make a second attempt at a listing this year is Propertyguru.

The owners of the Singapore online real estate listings business, which include Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and TPG Capital, around October last year joined other private equity firms in shelving their IPO plans.

Bain Capital placed its float plans on hold for Boost Juice owner Retail Zoo and KKR, Varde Partners and Deutsche Bank opted not to proceed with a listing of Latitude Financial.

PropertyGuru, advised by Credit Suisse, UBS, Ord Minnett and Morgans, was planning to sell shares at between $3.70 and $4.50 last year, as it looked to raise between $345m and $380m.

The raise took its market value to between $1.2bn and $1.4bn.

But PropertyGuru, which offers online real estate search services in Singapore, was described by prospective investors at the time as overpriced.

The company’s price range equated to between nine times and 10.9 times PropertyGuru’s forecast revenue.