Chunghwa Picture Tubes (CPT), Taiwan's third-largest flat panel maker, hopes to raise 3.6b yuan (US$435m) to expand in Chinese mainland by taking its Fuzhou plant public on the Shanghai A-share market this year, the company says.

A successful listing would represent a significant advance for overseas companies which have been pushing to gain access to China's local-currency stock market.

Chunghwa's initial public offering, if approved, would be only the second by a fully overseas company on the local yuan-dominated bourse. It would also be much larger than the first, Zhejiang King Refrigeration, a Taiwanese-funded manufacturer of air conditioners, which raised 280m yuan late last year.

"We have applied to sell 900m shares of our Fuzhou plant, which will be priced at Rmb4 each," said Sophia Tsao, an investor relations executive at CPT.

However, it is not clear how quickly the application might be approved by regulators in Beijing, which already have a long queue of companies qualified to list.

The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) has rationed listings over last year so as not to flood the struggling market with too many new shares.

However, the local A-share market has staged a small recovery since November, and also recorded large increase in turnover, which may encourage the CSRC to allow an increase in IPOs.

Beijing may also want to allow a number of Taiwanese companies to list on the mainland as a political gesture to encourage continued cross-straits trade and economic co-operation.

Officials at Taiwanese companies in mainland said Global Union, a Taiwan-controlled bathroom equipment maker in Shenzhen, was the most likely next candidate to get approval for its A-share listing application.

Taiwan's government pledged last year it would liberalise rules under which Taiwanese companies could raise money on the domestic market for investments in China, but has delayed those plans.

The Fuzhou plant, which is to be restructured into a subsidiary, would change its focus from the current cathode-ray tube monitor production to plasma displays, Ms Tsao said.

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