Unisys Corp has given up on trying to sell its defence systems business and has decided to try to get rid of it in an initial public offering. The new company will be called Paramax Inc and Unisys filed to offer 20m shares in it – the entire equity – at a target price of $22 to $25 per share. As well as the $460m or so it would hope to raise from the offering, Unisys will also take $332m cash out of the company, which will be headquartered in McLean, Virginia. The flotation would facilitate sale of the rest of Unisys to a foreign buyer – almost certainly Japanese if the company decided to seek that course as a way out of its problems.
