The Korean startup Jobis & Villains, an Artificial intelligence (AI) tax accounting service platform, is gearing up to launch an IPO. The market anticipates Jobis & Villains will reach valuation of more than 500 billion won ($376 million) due to the explosive growth of its accounting service platform, “Jobis.”
According to investment banking (IB) industry sources, Jobis & Villains plans to submit a preliminary review application for listing to the KOSDAQ market headquarters of the Korea Exchange in July. If the preliminary screening proceeds without a hitch, it is expected that the listing will be completed by the end of the year after receiving approval for the screening by October at the latest.
NH Investment & Securities is managing the listing for the issue. Additionally, the company aims to increase the number of circulating shares to ensure a smooth public offering. At the Jobis & Villains shareholders’ meeting on May 11th, Jobis & Villains decided to split the par value of the stock from 1,000 won ($.75) to 100 won ($0.075). As a result, the number of shares of Jobis & Villains will increase tenfold from 214,425 shares to 2,144,250 shares next month.
Jobis, a service designed to quickly estimate the total income tax refund amount, also aids in the refund process once authenticated as a Hometax member. After its launch in May 2020, the number of subscribers increased, mainly among young people who paid attention to the speed and convenience of the service. About 1.53 million people signed up for the platform in a year after its launch, and as of the end of last month, it has about 15.46 million subscribers. The cumulative amount of refunds totaled 606.2 billion won ($456 million).
The sales of Jobis & Villains also increased with the release of the service. Sales, which were 4.1 billion won ($3 million) in 2020, recorded 31.1 billion won ($23.4 million) in 2021 and 49.6 billion won ($37.3 million) in 2022.
Jobis & Villains expect sales in the first half of this year to be about 40 billion won ($30 million), which is more than 80% of last year’s total sales. The platform’s overseas expansion is also in full swing. Jobis & Villains is planning to establish a subsidiary in the UK in March and launch its services starting from April of the following year.
According to Jobis & Villains, the cumulative amount of unreceived tax refunds in the UK amounts to 20 billion pounds (approximately 31 trillion won or $24 billion). Jobis & Villains was accused by the police in 2021 of illegal tax representation and mediation by the Korea Tax Association and the Korea Tax Accident Association, but all were acquitted last year.
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