Following the transaction, the London Tunnels plc (the Company) plans to redevelop the Kingsway Exchange Tunnels (the Tunnels) into a historical and cultural attraction.
The Tunnels were originally built in the early 1940s as a deep level shelter underneath Chancery Lane tube station. Initially they were used as offices of the operational staff of the London Civil Defence region, the Ministry of Works, the Combined Operations and the Inter Services Research Bureau. The site was transferred to the General Post Office in 1949. The original two-tunnel shelter was subsequently extended and made operational by 1954. In 1956 it became the termination point for the first transatlantic telephone cable. Ownership of the Tunnels was transferred to British Telecommunications plc in 1981 and for many years they housed telephone switches and equipment.
The Company intends to restore, adaptively reuse and bring life back to the Tunnels and develop them into a series of visitor attractions. This will offer a combination of heritage experiences and a cultural, well-designed, multi-sensory, digital experience. It is anticipated that the Tunnels will have a design capacity of approximately three million visitors per year.
The Board of Directors believe that the admission to Euronext Amsterdam will help London Tunnels take advantage of the size of scale of both the equity and debt capital markets in Europe. Access to a wider pool of investors will support the future ambitions of the redevelopment project in Central London.
The Company intends to raise up to £30 million through the issue of 15,000,000 new ordinary shares to institutional investors for up to 90 days following admission. Of this amount, the Company has received irrevocable commitments from 15 investors for an aggregate of £24,980,000.
Crowe acted as reporting accountant on the transaction. Our capital markets team was led by Paul Blythe, Monty Cann and Sacha Alam.
“We valued the support we received from Paul and the Crowe team in advising us with our admission to Euronext Amsterdam, marking an important and exciting chapter for The London Tunnels. We would certainly recommend Crowe to companies looking to perform Capital Markets transactions.”
Chief Operating Officer, The London Tunnels plc