Rubicon announces £5.5 million Placing

24 July 2012

LONRHO PLC

('Lonrho' or the 'Company')

Lonrho's recently listed aviation division, Rubicon Diversified Investments Plc ("Rubicon"), announces £5.5 million placing and signed Head of Terms for £5 million Equity Financing Facility

Rubicon (AIM:RUBI), Lonrho's newly listed aviation division, today announced that it has raised £5.5 million by way of a placing (the "Placing") of 137,500,000 new ordinary shares (the "Placing Shares") at 4 pence per share with institutional and corporate investors. The proceeds of the Placing will be used to further Rubicon's proposed launch of FastJet in Africa and for general working capital purposes.

Application has been made for the Placing Shares to be admitted to trading on AIM, which is expected to occur on 2 August 2012 ("Admission").

The Placing Shares will represent approximately 9.5 per cent of the issued ordinary share capital of Rubicon as enlarged by the Placing. Following Admission, Lonrho's interest in Rubicon will be reduced from 74.9 per cent to 67.6 per cent of Rubicon's issued ordinary share capital.

Rubicon has also signed Heads of Terms with Henderson Global Investors' subsidiary, Darwin Strategic Limited ("Darwin"), for the provision of a £5 million Equity Financing Facility ("EFF") over a period of 36 months. Darwin is a majority owned subsidiary of Henderson Global Investors' Alphagen Volantis fund. A further announcement will be made describing the terms of the EFF in more detail, once the final agreement has been entered into.

Ed Winter, Rubicon CEO, commented: 

"The additional funding will strengthen Rubicon's balance sheet and should increase the ability to lease aircraft on better commercial terms and assist with the roll-out of the Airbus A319 fleet in Africa. The first A319 is scheduled for delivery in October."

Enquiries:

Lonrho Plc +44 (0) 20 7016 5105

David Lenigas

Geoffrey White

David Armstrong

FTI Consulting +44 (0) 20 7831 3113

Edward Westropp

Georgina Bonham

Jefferies Hoare Govett +44 (0) 20 7029 8000

Sara Hale

Harry Nicholas

Simon Brown