“There is no music company who has done an IPO in the Philippines and we want to do a small one. We hope to sell 20 to 30 percent of the company (Viva Music) or between P1 billion and P1.5 billion…We’re valuing the company at P5 billion,” said del Rosario in an interview with BILYONARYO.
Del Rosario said he decided to fast-track Viva Music’s IPO in 2021 ahead of the previously announced Viva Communications IPO. “We feel na dapat unahin namin muna music and do the Viva Communication IPO two years from now,” said del Rosario.
Viva Music includes del Rosario’s Viva Records, Vicor Music Corp. and Viva Music Publishing which handles songwriters.
Viva Communication, which was supposed to launch its IPO this year,
covers del Rosario’s interests in film, concerts, streaming, talent management and events.
Del Rosario said the music business has enjoyed a resurgence in recent years with the rise of music streaming sites that allowed it to maximize the potential of its vast catalog of Filipino artists all over the globe.
Viva Music’s library and stable of artists cuts across generations of music lovers from the 70s (Rico J. Puno, VST & Co., Pilita Corrales) to 80s and 90s (Sharon Cuneta) to the 2000s (Sarah Geronimo and Ex-Battalion).
He said Viva Music has slashed its overhead expenses with fewer physical sales as 90 percent of Viva Music’s revenues come from streaming services like Amazon, iTunes, Spotify (“It has become our record store, we share revenues for every song we sell”) and YouTube (“We get revenues from ads and we earn four times more from US viewers compared to the Philippines”).
Del Rosario was optimistic Viva Music would get the premium pricing for its shares just like Warner Warner Music Group and Big Hit Entertainment (members of the K-pop boy band BTS are shareholders) as investors rack up their holdings in the booming music industry.
Warner was valued at $13 billion when it was listed on the New York Stock Exchange last June while Big Hit was valued at $4 billion with its IPO on October 15.
Del Rosario said Viva Music that has remained “dominant” in the music industry from creating the Manila Sound to attracting the best hip-hop and social media artists at present and he hoped that its IPO would be a hit with investors wanting to ride on the sexy industry.