| Headline: Critical mission for Ixia Source: Euromoney Date: February 2001 Author: Antony Currie Issuer: Ixia Amount: $82 million Date: October 17 2000 Bookrunner: Merrill Lynch In a year when tech and internet stocks took a hammering, few such deals stand out. One of them was Ixia, which came to market on October 17. It was hardly a good time for new issues, as the Nasdaq and the Dow Jones indices were both suffering another dizzy downturn, registering 10% and 6% losses in the days before the deal was priced. And the composite of stocks of comparable companies was down 15%. Only one other deal was priced during Ixia’s 10-day roadshow, and 16 deals had been pulled. Nonetheless lead-manager Merrill Lynch decided to go ahead. “Ixia has strong business fundamentals and financial characteristics,” says George Francisco of Merrill’s equity capital markets group. “It has growth on the top line, and a strong profit on the bottom line.” Its gross margins are significantly above the industry norm at 80%, and it has a bottom line strong enough actually to allow investors to assess it on a price-earnings basis. That comes from what Francisco calls Ixia’s “mission critical” work for its clients. |