The leaders of Excelerate Energy LP have filed papers to take public the Texas-based liquid natural gas infrastructure company.
Formed in 2003, Excelerate runs what it says is the world’s largest portfolio of floating LNG terminals and focuses on servicing emerging markets. Headquartered in The Woodlands, it also has offices in Abu Dhabi, Antwerp, Boston, Buenos Aires, Chattogram, Dhaka, Doha, Dubai, Manila, Rio de Janeiro, Singapore and Washington, DC. Nearly completely owned by Tulsa investor and veteran oil-and-gas executive George Kaiser, it posted a net profit of $43.0 million on revenues of $550 million in the first 9 months of 2021. About half of its sales come from customers in the Asia-Pacific region, with the Middle East and North Africa accounting for another 25%.
A number of details of the company’s planned IPO, including how much money it is aiming to raise and the offering’s timeline, are yet to be fleshed out. But in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, President and Chief Executive Officer Steven Kobos and his team say they are looking to put at least some of their expected proceeds toward their terminal projects in Brazil, Albania, the Philippines, and Bangladesh, as well as the purchase of two tankships (which Excelerate has been leasing) from a subsidiary of the George Kaiser Family Foundation.
Excelerate last month started importing LNG and selling regasified natural gas to Petrobras, for which it has provided regasification services at three terminals since 2012. In their prospectus, company execs say their work plays a vital role in improving the energy infrastructure of markets facing various development roadblocks and is a crucial part of the global economy’s shift to lower-carbon energy production and consumption.
“Even the most aggressive scenarios that call for a larger role for renewables and new technology in decarbonization efforts fail to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goals without substantial growth in natural gas volumes, including in the form of LNG, through 2040,” the filing reads.
Investment bankers from Barclays Capital, JPMorgan Securities, and Morgan Stanley & Co. are handling the planned share listing. If the IPO is completed, Excelerate shares will trade under the ticker symbol EE and Kaiser will retain majority control.
Geert De Lombaerde | Senior Editor
A native of Belgium, Geert De Lombaerde has more than two decades of business journalism experience and writes about markets and economic trends for Endeavor Business Media publications Healthcare Innovation, IndustryWeek, FleetOwner, Oil & Gas Journal and T&D World. With a degree in journalism from the University of Missouri, he began his reporting career at the Business Courier in Cincinnati and later was managing editor and editor of the Nashville Business Journal. Most recently, he oversaw the online and print products of the Nashville Post and reported primarily on Middle Tennessee’s finance sector as well as many of its publicly traded companies.