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Breakfast News - AUdioboom, Atlantis Resources, Johnson Service Group and more...

Published: 21:35 05 Jan 2018 AEDT

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What’s cooking in the IPO kitchen?

NEX Exchange

Whetstone Capital No raise. Due 5 January 2018. Mkt Cap £1.6m.  Investment Vehicle for small and mid sized private and public companies.

 

 

AIM

Cradle Arc—holding company of a group of companies focused on the exploration and development of precious and base metals projects in Africa. Offer raising £2.4m with market cap of £20.13m. Expected 10 Jan 2018

Volex (LON:VLX) —The global provider of cable assemblies is proposing to move from the main market to AIM on 19 January. £75m market cap. FYMar18E rev £241.5m and £7.19m PBT.

OnTheMarket—Intention to float on AIM to raise c.£50m which will be used to fund the growth of the OnTheMarket.com portal, already the third biggest UK residential property portal provider. Expected valuation £200m to £250m.

 

Main Market Premium Listing

GEMS Education—report by Reuters that the private schools group is seeking a $4.5bn to $5bn London float in 2018. FYAug17 rev $926.2m and adjusted EBITDA $261.6m.

Vivo Energy—The Africa-focused company, which operates around 1,800 Shell forecourts across 16 countries  reported by City A.M. to be preparing for a London float next year

  
 
Breakfast buffet

Audioboom (LON:BOOM) 3.2p £30.2m

Audioboom, the spoken word audio on-demand platform, announced that it has signed a multi-year contract to host Casefile, a true crime podcast, on its digital platform. The Board is hopeful that the contract will generate potentially material incremental hosting, distribution and advertising revenues from Casefile podcasts in the Company's current and future financial years.

Launched in January 2016, Casefile regularly features among the top 50 shows on the Apple Podcasts chart, rising as high as fourth in July 2016.

Casefile's mini-series on Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe received 5.8 million downloads. Its most popular single episode was on tourist Peter Falconio, who disappeared, presumed murdered, in the Australian outback. That episode has more than 4.2 million downloads.

Casefile moves to Audioboom for no acquisition cost in a commercially focused revenue sharing agreement, which further demonstrates Audioboom's growing industry recognition as the 'go-to' podcast advertising company for podcasters and advertisers across the globe.

The Board believes that the acquisition of some of the biggest podcasts in the world will help drive audience adoption of Audioboom's original content network which launched in 2017. The Audioboom Originals network comprises hit shows like Mission To Zyxx and Deliberations, with a slate of 15 podcasts due to launch in 2018. The Board believes that the Audioboom Originals network will generate higher returns for the Company through stronger margins and IP ownership.

 

Atlantis Resources (LON:ARL) SUSPENDED

Atlantis, a global leader in the tidal power sector, announced that it has agreed to sell its stake in its Canadian joint venture to its partner DP Energy, a leading renewable energy developer, at the FORCE facility in the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia, Canada.

Atlantis and DP Energy have entered into a conditional sale and purchase agreement for the sale of Atlantis' 50% interest in Atlantis Operations (Canada) Limited ("AOCL") which will be renamed after the sale is completed.

The cash transaction, completion of which is subject to satisfaction of certain conditions, including receipt of required approval from the Nova Scotia Minister of Energy, would enable DP Energy to take a more integrated approach to the development of the AOCL berth named 'Charlie' alongside its other managed berth 'Echo' at the FORCE facility.

This transaction will allow Atlantis' project development team to focus on other opportunities in the UK, Europe and Asia and will enable the DP Energy team, who are experienced in renewable energy project development in Canada, to further focus their efforts on the successful development of the tidal in-stream power generation sector in Nova Scotia.

 

Johnson Service Group (LON:JSG) 144p £529.41m

JSG, a leading UK textile rental provider, provided a trading update for the six months to 31 Dec 2017 and announced the acquisition of StarCounty Textile Services Limited, which was completed on 11 Dece 2017.

The Group has continued to trade well in H2, with results for the full financial year expected to be slightly ahead of management expectations.

The Board has previously communicated its focus on considering further opportunities to develop the business and announces the acquisition of the entire share capital of StarCounty, a specialist hotel and catering linen business for a total cash consideration of £3.9m, on a debt free, cash free basis, including a freehold site valued at £0.9m.

StarCounty, based in Wrexham, has been operating in the North West and the Midlands for over 50 years, serving a range of customers including budget hotel chains, country house hotels, restaurants and catering establishments. The acquisition will support and extend the geographical coverage of our Stalbridge Linen brand across the North West and West Midlands, increasing its processing capacity and also improving the efficiency of the logistics network.

 

Cabot Energy (LON:CAB) 5.3p £16.9m

Cabot Energy, the  oil and gas company focused on production led growth balanced with high impact exploration and appraisal opportunities, provided the provisional results from the drilling and flow test of the 10-32 sidetrack well in the Rainbow area in Canada, which was drilled in Dec 2017.

Drilling

· The 10-32 sidetrack kicked off from the original well bore at a depth of 1,244 metres and extended for an additional 988 metres in length

· Approximately 400 metres were drilled through the targeted reef with around 200 metres of the wellbore encountering high porosity reservoir

Flow test

· The well was swab tested over a total period of 38 hours and cleaned up throughout the test

· During the final four hour flow period, the well was producing at an extrapolated daily rate of 408 barrels of fluid per day, of which 344 barrels was oil

· The well is expected to produce dry oil once all the completion fluid has been recovered

The 10-32 well is tied into the 13-36 facility and it is planned that it will be put on production with a pump later in Jan. The initial rate is expected to be approximately 200 barrels of oil per day to manage the longer term production potential of the reservoir. The work on the 14-22 recompletion well will now be undertaken as part of the winter work programme commencing in Jan. A full Company production and operational update, including 2018 guidance, will be provided later in Jan.

 

Mporium (LON:MPM) 8p £42m

Mporium Group, the technology firm delivering event-driven marketing, announced a commercial agreement for its IMPACT technology services with leading media investment management company GroupM UK.

Following the successful implementation of IMPACT within a number of GroupM agencies, a commercial agreement has now been signed with the wider group. This agreement provides access to the IMPACT technology across the GroupM agencies.

Mporium's proprietary technology, IMPACT, enables advertisers, and the agencies that serve them, to identify and monetise micro-moments; those moments when there are significant changes in the levels of consumer intent. This results in improved performance for digital advertising campaigns, from brand advertising to direct response.

IMPACT leverages a range of data inputs, including TV, news, sports, influencers and social media to manage in real-time the pricing, timing and selection of content for digital advertising campaigns.

 

Abcam (LON:ABC) 1,019p £2,082m

Abcam, the supplier of life science research tools, announced the following unaudited trading update ahead of its results for the six months ended 31 Dec 2017.

Overall, they expect to report revenue growth for the H1 of approximately 11% on a constant currency basis and approximately 10% on a reported basis. They remain on track to deliver against their constant currency revenue growth target of around 10% for the full year.

Catalogue revenue grew by over 11% in the first half of the year, with all product categories growing ahead of estimated underlying market growth rates.

Custom products and licensing revenue, which represented over 6% of the total for the period, increased by approximately 8%.

Their business in China continues to operate well and we expect revenue growth of over 24% in the first half, ahead of the market growth rate in the territory.

Investments in R&D, their organisation, global ERP system, and facilities continue according to plan, and underlying gross margins remain in line with our expectations.

 

Gear4music (LON:G4M) 776p £161m

Gear4music, the online retailer of musical instruments and music equipment, announced a trading update for the four months from 1 Sept 2017 to 31 Dec2017.

· 42% increase in total sales with continuing strong growth into the UK and Europe during an important trading period

· On a two-year basis, sales growth was 120%, ahead of the 114% for the same period last year

· Both Own-brand and Other-brand revenues grew by 42% during the period

· Active Customer numbers up by 38% to 450,000 at 31 December 2017, compared with 31 December 2016

· Website conversion improved to 3.3% in the period, up from 3.0% last year

 

Kibo Mining (LON:KIBO) 6.1p £24.25m

Kibo Mining, the multi-asset African focused energy and resource company, confirmed that further to the meetings held with the Ministry of Energy ('ME') in late Dec 2017, the ME has called a meeting on 8 Jan with Kibo and the Tanzania Electric Supply Company to finalise the Mbeya Coal to Power Project MOU; accordingly, the Company remains optimistic that the MOU will be completed as announced on 18 Dec 2017.  It should be noted that the Tanzanian holidays differ from the UK, with fewer 'working days' over the Christmas period.

The Company had arranged to present at a Proactive Event in London on 11 January 2018, however, the meeting with the ME has taken precedence and accordingly Kibo has postponed its attendance at the event.

Australian Strategic Materials signs US$600 million LoI

Rowena Smith, CEO and managing director of Australian Strategic Materials Ltd (ASX:ASM, OTC:ASMMF), joins Jonathan Jackson in the Proactive studio to discuss the company’ s Dubbo Project, in Central West New South Wales. This project aims to extract and process critical minerals and rare earth...

9 hours, 52 minutes ago