Emanuel has been wanting to take Endeavor public ever since the $2.4B acquisition of IMG in '13GETTY IMAGES
If Endeavor CEO Ari Emanuel succeeds with the company's newly announced IPO, "not only will he finally be the Hollywood mogul he has long aspired to be, and the first to take public what is essentially a talent agency," he will also "turn a lot of skeptics, many of whom work for him, into true believers," according to William Cohan of VANITY FAIR. Endeavor is currently a "shopping cart overflowing with more than 20 different acquisitions that Emanuel has made using a lot of other people’s money." Endeavor has a "controlling stake" in UFC, a stake in PBR, a "minority stake" in IMG and a stake in the ATP/WTA Miami Open. Emanuel has been "wanting to take Endeavor public for years, ever since he completed the ill-fated" $2.4B acquisition of IMG in '13. In the years since private equity firm Silver Lake "teamed up with Emanuel and his partner," Endeavor Exec Chair Patrick Whitesell, to buy IMG, "various versions of last week’s registration statement have been drafted, and then set aside in search of the right moment when the IPO market would be receptive to the nutty Endeavor story." That moment "appears to be now." The proceeds from the IPO will be "used for 'working capital and general corporate purposes' and 'may' also be used to pay down debt or for new acquisitions." According to the company’s registration statement, Endeavor had $4.1B of "net debt," some 15 times its '18 EBITDA (VANITYFAIR.com, 5/31).
