17th Dec 2015 12:38
LONDON (Alliance News) - Northbridge Industrial Services PLC Thursday said it has promoted Iwan Phillips to become the company's new chief financial officer and said it has agreed revised covenants with its two banks.
The revised covenants have been agreed with Royal Bank of Scotland PLC and Belgium's KBC Bank NV. Northbridge said it would have to reset some of its covenants in its first half results.
On Thursday, Northbridge said the banks have waived the testing of the covenants for the quarter to end December 31, with testing to resume on the new covenants in the quarter to end March 31, 2016, until the loan expires in May 2019.
Northbridge said the new covenants take into account the company's current trading circumstances following on from its first half results. The company swung to a GBP2.1 million pretax loss in the half from a GBP3.3 million profit a year before, after revenue fell and costs related to its restructuring began to mount. That led the company to slash its interim dividend by more than half.
Northbridge's first half was hit hard by the downturn in spending by oil and gas companies, which have been cutting spending and delaying and cancelling projects following the sharp drop in the world oil price over the past year.
In response, Northbridge trimmed its senior management, resulting in Finance Director Craig Robinson leaving the company, with Northbridge appointing Company Secretary and Financial Controller Phillips to take over the role.
Northbridge said it will not appoint a replacement until market improved, but Thursday said Phillips would take on the chief financial officer role full time whilst retaining the role of company secretary and financial controller. However, Phillips will not be appointed to the board.
"This largely concludes the re-organisation, rationalisation and cost cutting measures that began earlier in 2015. Our pre-close statement, which we expect to release as usual during the week commencing 1 February 2016, will include an update on both current trading and the underlying market conditions affecting the industries that we serve," said Northbridge.
Northbridge shares were trading up 1.2% to 88.0 pence per share on Thursday.
By Joshua Warner; [email protected]; @JoshAlliance
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