UK technology leaders gave the thumbs up to reports that prime minister, Rishi Sunak, has revived talks to convince the foreign owner of Arm to list in London as well as New York.
According to the Financial Times the PM met the British technology group’s chief executive Rene Haas in Downing Street last month to discuss its future while Masayoshi Son, the billionaire founder of Arm’s owner Softbank, joined the meeting via video link.
Japanese multinational Softbank bought the Cambridge-based business in 2016 for £26bn but now wants to offload it.
An attempt by US chip giant Nvidia to buy it for US$40bn fell flat last year amid intense regulatory scrutiny pushing SoftBank to prepare plans for Arm to be spun off.
A stock market listing on the Nasdaq in New York is the preferred option but the UK government and the London Stock Exchange are pushing for Arm shares to be listed in Britain as well.
Arm was formerly listed on both the FTSE 100 and Nasdaq before it was bought by Softbank and politicians lobbied last summer to bring this tech giant gem back to British soil.
But the political turmoil in Westminster and the wider lack of appetite for IPOs saw Softbank abandon flotation plans last year, leaving the listing location up for grabs.
Russ Shaw, founder of Tech London Advocates, a global network of tech founders, said “A flotation would give Arm a unique position in London and make them a harbinger to attract other tech talent into the capital."
"A floatation would give Arm a unique position in London and make them a harbinger to attract other tech talent into the capital"@RussShaw1 in @thisismoney on the PM's renewed push for a dual listing of @Arm ????https://t.co/s2GQOrJtzg
— TechLondonAdvocates (@TechLondonAdv) January 10, 2023
While The Daily Mail quoted Gerard Grech, who heads up another UK founder network Tech Nation, as saying: ‘To have a listing in London would be seen as a significant vote of confidence in the UK market, while for Arm tapping into both exchanges could potentially increase its access to capital.”