SÃO PAULO, Brazil – JBS SA, the world’s largest meatpacker, is moving forward with plans for its consolidated subsidiary, JBS Foods International (JBSFI) BV, to be publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange.
The JBS SA board of directors approved the filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for an initial public offering for JBSFI. JBS expects to complete the IPO in the first half of 2017, but the timing, number of shares and price of the proposed offering have not been determined.
The official seat and registered address for JBSFI is in the Netherlands, and will house all JBS international businesses and Seara. JBS SA will maintain control of its Brazilian beef and leather processing businesses.
“The company believes that this revised structure and proposed IPO reflects its global production platform, product portfolio and broad international customer base,” the company said in a statement.
Wesley Mendonça Batista will be the chairman, a non-executive director, of JBSFI. The board of directors of JBSFI will include nine members, the majority of whom will be independent. Gilberto Tomazoni, who has held senior executive positions at JBS for the past four years, will be the CEO, while Russ Colaco will be CFO.
JBS SA executives were forced to seek alternative growth strategies after Brazil’s development bank, BNDES and minority shareholder in JBS, vetoed JBS’s plans to reorganize its business. Under the proposed reorganization JBS intended to contribute all of its assets except its Brazilian beef business to a new holding company called New Holdco, according to documents filed with the SEC. New Holdco was to be a wholly-owned subsidiary of JBS International, while JBS SA was designated as a consolidated subsidiary of JBS Foods International and still trading separately on the Brazilian stock exchange.
