Osram lightbulb maker debuts on stock market

German lighting company Osram, the world's second largest, had its stock market debut on Monday after spinning off from engineering giant Siemens, and in initial trading the shares fell 3.8 percent. The shares were issued at 24.00 euros ($31) but in early deals they fell to just above 23 euros. The offer of 104.7 million shares valued the listed portion of Osram at about 2.5 billion euros ($3.2 billion). Siemens retained 17 percent of the company and the Siemens pension fund kept 2.5 percent. In Monday's Frankfurt stock market debut, Siemens -- rather than launching a traditional public offering for Osram -- handed each shareholder one Osram share for every 10 Siemens shares they hold. This meant that for just one day the Frankfurt DAX index had 31 rather than 30 listed companies. The start of trading had been delayed several times since Siemens scrapped plans for a public offering in 2011 because of market volatility amid the eurozone debt crisis. Osram, with about 40,000 staff worldwide, is undergoing restructuring after suffering a net loss of 378 million euros last year and has said it would shed 8,000 jobs by 2014. Long a leader in making lightbulbs, along with General Electrics and Philips, Osram has faced stiff competition from players such as Samsung and LG as the market has shifted toward low-energy bulbs and light-emitting diodes.