Japan's Line to make its IPO debut

Popular Japanese mobile messaging system Line will make its U.S. public trading debut Thursday after raising $1.15 billion in an IPO that priced earlier this week.

The company offered 22 million shares of common stock under the symbol "LN" on the New York Stock Exchange — as American depositary shares — and other exchanges priced at $32.84. In Japan, Line offered 13 million shares that will begin trading Friday on the Tokyo Stock Exchange under the code "3938."

It's the biggest global tech IPO since Chinese e-commerce site Alibaba raised more than $20 billion in September 2014.

Line on Monday priced its IPO at the top of its expected range, which had been 2,900 to 3,300 yen per share, starting at about $28. That range was an increase from its original plan to sell as much as 35 million shares at $26.30 a share, according to its original Securities and Exchange Commission filing.

It could also sell an additional 5 million shares if there is strong demand, raising the total IPO amount to $1.3 billion.

Japan's Line lines up for large IPO

Line, which is owned by South Korea's Naver Corp., has a messaging app used by 675 million registered users, of which 218 million are monthly active users, primarily in Japan, Taiwan, Thailand and Indonesia. Its messaging app lets consumers sent texts messages, photos and emojis over device data plans, rather than short messaging systems (SMS) sold by wireless carriers.

The IPO aims to help Line in its global expansion and growing competition with other apps such as Facebook's Messenger app and WhatsApp service, Microsoft's Skype and Tencent's WeChat.

Line’s IPO success could persuade wary Wall Street investors to consider more IPOs after a volatile market, interest-rate uncertainty and steep declines in venture funding all but smothered the notion in early 2016.

Venture capitalists poured more than $20 billion into 1,906 completed deals in the U.S. in the second quarter. The funding, predominately in unicorns, represented an 11% increase from the same quarter last year, and could stoke more activity in tech IPOs.

Marc Andreessen, co-founder of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, last month predicted a rush of IPOs in 2017 and 2018 and more mergers and acquisitions this year.

This year, however, it’s been slow going. Only four tech companies have gone public, compared with 14 at the same time a year ago, according to Renaissance Capital.

Twilio (TWLO), the first unicorn to go public this year, burst out of the IPO gates: Its shares rocketed 92% in their first day of trading in late June. The cloud computing company's first-day spike made it the largest of four tech IPOs this year, as measured by market value (nearly $2.4 billion).

Twilio surges in IPO debut, hopeful sign for tech unicorns

Follow Mike Snider on Twitter: @MikeSnider