I have spent a considerable amount of time researching and analysing tomorrow’s Aim flotation of Strix (KETL:100p), a global leader in the manufacture and design of kettle safety controls.
The shares list on London’s junior market at 100p each at 8am on Tuesday 8 August after the company’s broker and nominated adviser, Zeus Capital, placed £190m of shares with institutions to buy out private equity owners AAC Capital, which has owned the business for the past 12 years. They may be cashing in their chips, but I believe this could be one of the IPO winners of the year and not just because the shares are being listed on an attractive single-digit earnings multiple and offer a 7 per cent prospective dividend yield.
The Isle of Man-based company has been around in its current form since 1982, having been originally founded by Eric Taylor in 1951 to commercialise product opportunities for a revolutionary thermostat he invented to control heated flying suites worn by bomber crews at high altitude during the Second World War. His son John Taylor subsequently took over the reins and by the late 1980s Strix had become a world leader in the supply of safety controls for small domestic appliances, primarily kettles, which disconnect the power to the heating element when either the water has boiled, there is no water present, or when the kettle is lifted off its base. The company has been incredibly successful, having sold over 1.9bn sets of its safety kettle controls to date. As a result, a kettle using one of Strix’s safety controls is boiled more than 1bn times a day by consumers across more than 100 countries, accounting for over 10 per cent of the world’s population.