12th Sep 2019 13:08
(Alliance News) - appScatter Group PLC on Thursday announced the signing of a new loan facility as well as a widened loss in the first half of the year from the amortisation of intangible assets, mostly acquired from its Priori Data GmbH acquisition.
Moreover, the firm also said it has only received GBP1.6 million of its outstanding GBP2.2 million share subscription in April. In is not expecting the remaining GBP600,000 to be received, and so will only issue 6.0 million shares at a price of 26.9 pence for the GBP1.6 million.
The app management and data intelligence platform said it signed an up to EUR5.0 million loan from Harbert European Speciality Lending which will help complete the planned acquisition of Airpush Inc, also announced in April, as well as supporting "the day to day running of the business".
The loan will be drawn down in tranches, starting with a EUR750,000 advance to "be drawn in the coming days" and a second advance once the Airpush buy gets shareholders approval. Further advances will be available until August 2020. appScatter will pay an 11% per annum interest on funds drawn at any time.
appScatter will issue warrants to Harbert on drawdown of the first advance, equivalent to GBP208,333 plus 5.3% of the second and any further advances drawn down up to GBP208,333.
Chief Executive Phillip Marcella said: "I am delighted to have secured this additional funding which will be used to progress the transaction, I look forward to the readmission of the enlarged group."
The firm posted a pretax loss of GBP5.1 million, widened from GBP3.4 million, of which GBP2.1 related to intangible asset amortisation. appScatter said most of these amortised assets were from its GBP13.5 million Priori Data buy in July 2018.
Revenue declined 21% to GBP710,926 from GBP904,169. appScatter said the 2018 figure " included accrued revenue of GBP576,573 of which only GBP38,000 was ultimately recognised in the full year accounts" so that the adjusted revenue figure for the first half of 2018 would have been GBP365,596.
appScatter held back commercial launch of its appScatter programme, which hurt its revenue performance in the period and led to a lower result than forecast.
Marcella commented: "The key focus areas for the period under review has been the continued integration of Priori Date and Abilott, as well as the process of the reverse acquisition of AirPush. Post period end, we are delighted to have been able to announce additional commercial agreements with Bango and Interarrows, illustrating the strength of the appScatter offering and dedication of the leadership team we have in place.
"The integration process has taken longer than expected and with the focus of the management directed at the proposed acquisition of Airpush, short term revenue growth has been affected. We are encouraged however, that once the integration processes have been completed for Priori, Abilott and AirPush, we will return to stronger levels of revenue growth."
Due to the Airpush buy, the firm's shares are currently suspended and last traded at 17.25 pence in April.