(Reuters) - Hyzon Motors Inc has agreed to go public through a merger with blank-check firm Decarbonization Plus Acquisition Corp in a deal that values the fuel-cell truck startup at $2.7 billion, it said on Tuesday.
The electric vehicle market has seen a surge in companies choosing mergers with special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) as the route to go public instead of traditional initial public offerings.
EV charging network EVgo Services LLC and EV maker Faraday Future are set to go public later this year through mergers with SPACs, which are shell companies that raise funds through an IPO to take a private company public.
Decarbonization Plus will fund the Hyzon deal through a private investment of $400 million from investors, including funds and accounts managed by BlackRock Inc and private investment firm Riverstone Energy.
The transaction is expected to result in total gross proceeds of about $626 million.
Rochester, New York-based Hyzon was founded in 2003 and makes hydrogen fuel-cell powered zero-emission commercial vehicles, a sector that has seen increased investor interest after the listing of Nikola Corp last year.
Hyzon in 2019 developed fuel-cell platforms for more than 400 vehicles and expanded into Europe last year with a facility in the Netherlands.
Goldman Sachs & Co was the sole financial advisor to Hyzon on the deal, while Credit Suisse and Citigroup served as financial and capital markets advisors to Decarbonization Plus.
Reporting by Sohini Podder in Bengaluru; Editing by Aditya Soni
Source: Reuters