Kingspan has shelved plans to publicly list its advanced building systems unit Advnsys, less than four months after announcing it to the market as the group sought to capitalise on the artificial intelligence-driven boom in data centre construction.
The Cavan-based insulation giant said on Wednesday that it will now retain 100 per cent ownership of the unit. Kingspan will also hold a capital markets day in the US later in the year to provide “further insights” on the strategy, it said.
Chief executive Gene Murtagh said the group was “very pleased with investor appetite” for Advnsys, a world leader in bespoke critical infrastructure primarily focused on data centres, ventilation, and daylighting.
“In light of that interest, and given current momentum and outlook, our considered view is that retaining full ownership of this fast-growing business is the optimum route to maximise value for our stakeholders,” he said.
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Kingspan said it believes strongly in the unit’s trajectory, including its target of more than doubling earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) over the next four to five years.
The group’s Dublin-listed shares fell by more than 3 per cent in early trading on Wednesday before paring losses later in the day.
In September, the group announced that it was exploring plans to list about 25 per cent of the business on Euronext Amsterdam as soon as the first quarter of 2026.
Shares in Kingspan jumped as much as 13.5 per cent immediately after the initial announcement.
Still, analysts on Wednesday broadly welcomed the decision to drop the spin out.
“The more granular level of information that has been published by Kingspan on Advynsys since the potential IPO was announced makes us even more bullish on the medium-term prospects for the group as a whole,” Goodbody analyst Shane Carberry said in a research note. “The backdrop for Advynsys continues to go from strength to strength and as the group further unlocks the significant opportunities to gain greater share of wallet, not just through increasing its array of products but also through modularity, future ambitions to double profitability look very well underpinned,” he added.
Pulling back from the IPO meanwhile has “no impact on our financial forecasts as we had not made any adjustments for this possibility,” said Davy analyst Flor O’Donoghue. “Kingspan remains exceptionally well placed as a business, and this should be confirmed when the group announces 2025 results in February,” he added.
The planned IPO could have valued Advynsys at about €6 billion if it had gone ahead, Mr O’Donoghue said when Kingpsan announced its IPO plan.
Advynsys accounts for about a fifth of Kingspan’s group earnings as it stands.
The artificial intelligence (AI) boom has seen a surge in data centre construction around the world, as companies from OpenAI to Google pump billions into building out the computing power needed for their large language models.
The data centre sector could require as much as $3 trillion (€2.6 trillion) in spending globally between now and 2030 to meet demand, property firm JLL said in a report published this week.
