Nielsen Holdings BV, the television-audience rating company owned by KKR & Co., Thomas H. Lee Partners LP, Blackstone Group LP and Carlyle Group, filed to raise as much as $1.75 billion in an initial
public offering. Nielsen has operations in more than 100 countries and measures audiences across TV, radio, Web sites and mobile phones and provides brand and market-research services.
Nielsen will use the proceeds to help pay down its $8.6 billion in debt, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The New York-based company didn't disclose how many shares
it would offer or at what price it would sell the stock. Nielsen is going public four years after it was acquired by a group of six leveraged buyout firms for $10.2 billion. Revenue rose 9 percent to
$1.2 billion in the first quarter from $1.1 billion a year earlier, according to the filing.
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