Siemens Enterprise Plans IPO for 2012

Siemens Enterprise Communications wants an initial public offering in the United States by end 2012, Reuters reported Tuesday. SEN specializes in communications systems for large corporations. The company’s current owners are Siemens, which holds a 49% stake, and private equity firm Gores Group, which owns the rest.

(Reuters) – Siemens Enterprise Communications wants an initial public offering in the United States by end 2012, Chief Executive Hamid Akhavan told Reuters on Tuesday.

Akhavan said he would strive for a listing in the U.S., where technology stocks tend to get a better valuation than comparable companies in Europe.

“We could use the shares as currency for an acquisition,” said Akhavan, who was speaking at technology fair CeBIT.

SEN specializes in communications systems for large corporations and competes with companies like Cisco Systems Inc , privately held Avaya and Microsoft Corp.

Siemens Enterprise Communication, which is also known as SEN Group, will follow a slew of tech companies such as LinkedIn Corp and Groupon Inc which have successfully gone public despite a broader freeze in the markets amid the European debt crisis and global economic uncertainty.

A series of technology companies including software makers Palo Alto Networks, ServiceNow, Workday, Splunk and flash memory maker Violin Memory are in various stages of planning public offerings this year, sources familiar with the matter have said.

Akhavan said he believes the company’s current owners, Siemens which holds a 49 percent stake, and private equity firm Gores Group, which owns the rest, will seek to place only a minority stake with shareholders.