LED leader reaps IPO riches

Sun Qinghuan, chairman of MLS Co, China's biggest producer of light-emitting diodes, is poised to become a billionaire with an initial public offering.

MLS is planning to sell 44.5 million shares for 21.5 yuan ($3.44) on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, according to a filing on Monday. Sun will own about 357 million shares after the IPO, giving him a net worth of about $1.2 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Sun, 42, joins a rising number of Chinese entrepreneurs who have become billionaires as investors drive up the values of newly traded companies. The light-bulb maker last year was ranked the world's 10th-biggest for packaged LEDs, according to market research firm IHS Technology.

"It's grown to become a big company," said Alice Tao, an LED and lighting industry analyst at IHS in Shanghai. "In China, there are very few other LED companies that have that kind of size and scale to compete with global LED manufacturers like Samsung, Osram or Philips."

The IPO was 65 times oversubscribed, according to the company's filing.

The Shenzhen Composite Index rose 2.47 percent on Tuesday.

An MLS representative who answered the company's main phone line declined to comment ahead of the IPO.

MLS products are used in computer appliances, traffic lights and shopping malls, according to its website. Its product line and research and development innovation are among its strengths, Changjiang Securities Co Ltd said in a report earlier this month.