Last August, the company was issuedSPAC The first, and only Israeli, on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange: Ai 1 Spock, led by CEO Lior Obsbyovich and entrepreneurs Yaron Bloch (chairman), Gil Deutsch, Roni Biram and Amir Efrati. The company raised NIS 400 million to use the amount to buy a company from Israel The raising was carried out according to conditions previously defined by the Securities Authority for SPAC issues on the local stock exchange, according to which the developers flowed 10% of the raising amount.
Ai Spack undertook to carry out a merger transaction within 24 months of the issue, and so far about 10 months have passed and no such transaction has been reported yet. Meanwhile, the state of the markets has changed significantly – which could affect SPAC merger moves in opposite ways: on the one hand, investors receive less with open arms any company that goes public and values fall, and on the other companies that need financing to continue their growth and want to become public can not An initial public offering, and a merger to SPAC is a good option for them.
And what’s going on in the Spock Islands? Meanwhile, in the first quarter of the year, the company reported management and general expenses of NIS 568,000, and a quarterly loss of NIS 3 million, mainly due to financing expenses, as the process of finding a target company for the merger continues.
According to Chairman Bloch, there are more and more inquiries to the Spock Islands today. Or underwriters who benefit from the very act of making the transaction or merger. We invest and do not sign, it is a long relationship. “
“‘The only store on the street still open'”
The declines in the markets are actually positive for the Spock Islands, according to Bloch: “When we left, it was clear to us that the Israeli device is more suitable for a declining market, because in an emerging market it will be more challenging to merge with a company under proper conditions.”
“While entrepreneurs and financial intermediaries in the United States are encouraged to make a quick and high-value transaction, in Israel developers are investing significant personal money and are encouraged to make a profitable transaction over the next few years. This is a very significant difference,” he notes. “No one is happy that the markets are falling, but in favor of this device – we have been waiting for declines. We have had more and more inquiries recently from entities interested in becoming public and raising money for expansion plans.
“In this respect, we are largely ‘the only store still open on the street.’ NIS 400 million that are in trust and waiting for a merger transaction. The process is faster, can include elements that do not exist in a normal IPO, and allows the merging company a high level of certainty.”
Some of the companies that apply to the Spac Islands are not suitable for a merger for various reasons, and Bloch notes that “in the end we will make one merger on a significant scale, so we are picky.”
In contrast to SPAC companies issued on Wall Street, where the distribution of investors is usually large, the Spac Islands have a limited number of investors, and Bloch sees this as a significant advantage: “Our anchor investors are few and are among the leading institutions in the Israeli capital market – Harel, Migdal. And training.
“Along with the developers, they constitute an absolute and large majority of the shareholders in Spock. This fact allows for focused and quick decision-making, and also puts a very high-quality and well-known group of investors ahead of the merging company.”