By Justin Baer And Douglas MacMillan
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. is offering its wealth-management
clients an opportunity to invest in Uber Technologies Inc., the
ride-sharing company that has become one of Silicon Valley's most
highly valued startups, according to a person familiar with the
matter.
Goldman itself is already one of Uber's institutional investors.
The new convertible-debt offering is a private placement
exclusively for Goldman's high-net-worth clients, and could raise
hundreds of millions of dollars, the person said.
Clients of Goldman's wealth-management division typically must
have a net worth of more than $10 million. The division's some 600
advisers oversee about $300 billion in client assets.
News of the private placement was reported earlier by
Fortune.
In 2011, Goldman also allowed its wealthy clients the chance to
invest in Facebook Inc. ahead of the social-networking company's
anticipated initial public offering. For Facebook, Goldman clients
were offered the opportunity to purchase equity, whereas the Uber
offering is in convertible debt.
Uber, which is private, has separately raised more than $1
billion from institutional backers including Goldman, several
venture-capital firms and a handful of mutual-fund managers. The
Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month that the company is
in talks to sell equity in a round of funding likely to value it at
more than $30 billion.
Write to Justin Baer at justin.baer@wsj.com and Douglas
MacMillan at douglas.macmillan@wsj.com
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