Like what SenseTime did not need American investors. The Chinese artificial intelligence company successfully completed its IPO on December 30 in Hong Kong, raising $ 851 million. The share’s value, set at 3.85 Hong Kong dollars, around 0.50 US dollars, climbed 23%.
Suspicion of SenseTime’s role in suppressing Uyghurs
The operation took more than a year to complete. As the deadline approaches, initially scheduled for December 17, the US authorities have decided to sanction the company by denying it access to US investors.
China makes it more difficult for its companies to go public on the stock market
The United States has long accused SenseTime, which claims to be the champion of facial recognition in China with 11% of the market, of having participated in the identification and repression of Uyghurs in Xinjiang. In 2019, the US Department of Commerce had already blacklisted him. SenseTime can no longer buy American technology without a license, a waiver.
SenseTime has consistently rejected accusations of human rights violations that it considers baseless. China itself denies the crackdown on the Uyghur Muslim minority despite evidence gathered by observers.
Can Chinese companies do without American investors?
These serious accusations did not prevent SenseTime from enjoying great success in Hong Kong. The company still had to reduce its ambitions and review its project. According to South China Morning Post it could have raised up to $ 2 billion without the controversies that accompanied the operation.
Still, the SenseTime case shows that Chinese companies can go public even without American backing. Hong Kong has risen to fourth in the stock market for IPOs in 2021.
A performance while 2021 was marked by Beijing’s crackdown on its technology companies. Billions of dollars in values have been blown away because of the measures taken by China. The success of SenseTime, however, fits perfectly into the plans of the Chinese administration, precisely engaged in firmly dissuading its companies from going to New York to access the stock market.