Polestar, the Swedish EV maker backed by Volvo and Leonardo DiCaprio, is going public via $20 billion SPAC deal

• Swedish EV maker Polestar will go public in a $20 billion deal with special purpose acquisition company Gores Guggenheim.
• Polestar makes high-performance vehicles and was founded by Volvo Cars and China's Zhejiang Geely Holding.
• The deal should close in the first half of 2022 and would bring Polestar to trade on the Nasdaq.

Polestar is preparing to go public through blank-check company Gores Guggenheim in a deal that values the Swedish electric vehicle maker at about $20 billion, the companies jointly said Monday.

The high-performance automaker was founded in 2017 by Volvo Cars and Chinese automaker Zhejiang Geely Holding, known as Geely, and counts Geely Chairman Eric Li and actor Leonardo DiCaprio among its investors. It's been positioning itself to rival Tesla and Lucid.

Current Polestar stakeholders will retain roughly 94% ownership in the company and roll 100% of their equity interests into the pro forma company. The SPAC deal implies an enterprise value of about $20 billion for the combined company, representing about 3.0 times estimated revenue for 2023, and 1.5x 2024 estimated revenue.

The newly formed company would be called Polestar Automotive Holding UK Ltd. and is expected to be listed on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol "PSNY".

The boards of Polestar and Gores Guggenheim have unanimously approved the deal, which is expected to close in the first half of 2022, subject to approval by Gores Guggenheim's stockholders and other closing conditions.

The company's Polestar 1 and Polestar 2 electric cars are already on roads in Europe, North America, and Asia. Deliveries reached about 10,000 vehicles in 2020, and management projects selling 290,000 vehicles a year by 2025.

Polestar plans to launch the premium electric SUV Polestar 3 in 2022, and introduce two more models by 2024 as it aims to expand global distribution to 30 markets by 2023.