Dubai Ports World will seek to attract international investors with an initial public offering (IPO) expected in the next 18  months, a company spokeswoman said.

Dubai Ports, which acquired British ports operator P&O this year, said in November that it was planning an IPO within two years. Dubai Ports’ holding company has issued a $3.5 billion Islamic bond, or sukuk, convertible into shares in any IPO.
“We have said since the sukuk that we would be IPOing within two years,” said Dubai Ports spokeswoman Sarah Lockey.
“It will happen within the next 18 months ... We are a global business and we are looking at a matching shareholder profile.”
She said the firm had not decided on the exact timing of the flotation, where shares would be listed, or how much of the company would be sold. The sukuk, the largest of its kind ever issued, is listed on the Dubai International Financial Exchange, which unlike most Gulf Arab bourses is open to investors of any nationality.
Dubai Ports has hired Dubai-based Shuaa Capital, Deutsche Bank, Merrill Lynch, and Dubai Islamic Bank to advise on the offering, the spokeswoman said. Dubai Ports completed its $6.85 billion takeover of P&O in March, but a US political storm over security concerns forced it to relinquish control of P&O’s’s assets in the US.