Malaysian palm oil producer Boustead Plantations Bhd priced its IPO at an indicative price range of 1.50 ringgit to 1.60 ringgit per share as it seeks to raise up to 1.05 billion ringgit ($327.05 million) in an initial public offering, its chairman said on Tuesday.

The company is the plantation arm of financial-to-defence conglomerate Boustead Holdings Bhd. It is offering 163.57 million shares to institutional investors and about 64 million to the Malaysian public.

Those shares are in addition to 428.43 million shares being offered to unit holders of Al-Hadharah Boustead Reit, Boustead Holdings and eligible directors and employees.

"I must say the demand for our stock has been quite encouraging," said Boustead Plantations's chairman, Lodin Wok Kamaruddin.

Lodin told reporters after the launch of the company's IPO prospectus that "if we are able to price it at 1.50 to 1.60 ringgit, we feel that certainly would be a good price for investors to take up the shares in the market," he added.

Boustead Plantations plans to use the proceeds to expand its total planted area to 100,000 hectares from the current 71,000 hectares by 2017 via acquisitions of existing plantations estates and reserve land mainly in Malaysia, Lodin said.

Pricing is slated for June 11 and its market debut set for June 26, according to the prospectus.

Affin Investment Bank, Credit Suisse and Maybank Investment Bank are the global coordinators, the prospectus showed.