M & A Rainmaker

If you have been to the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery recently you will have noticed that the Anglo-Saxon Golden Hoard found near Silicon Crossroads ( the junction of the old Watling Street and Rykneld Street - now the A5 and A38 ) Lichfield is missing.

The good news is that it is away doing a great job of promoting Staffordshire ( the old Mercia ) the Lichfield area and Silicon Crossroads to America.

As this article says the Saxon Hoard has gone to the National Geographic Museum in Washington D.C.  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-15496704 .

Washington D.C. is not one of the recognised ” Startup ” centres of the U.S. although Baltimore ( Maryland ) recently raised $84 Million via an innovative online auction of tax credits ( see  http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2012-03-15/news/bs-bz-invest-maryland-funding-20120315_1_tax-credits-investmaryland-program-christian-s-johansson ) in yet another example of U.S. startup funding initiatives.

There have also been a number of other ” Startups ” in the area e.g.

Cerecor Biotech http://www.bizjournals.com/baltimore/news/2012/04/04/cerecor-biotech-startup-headed-by.html

SemaConnect  http://www.bizjournals.com/baltimore/news/2011/11/28/annapolis-startup-semaconnect-raises.html

WooFound http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/technology/2011/11/baltimore_startup_woofound_rai.html

MoodleRooms http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/technology/2011/06/startup_story_baltimores_moodl_1.html

Nearby Pennsylvania also has a long standing history of investing in Startups:

http://www.prlog.org/11837942-ben-franklin-program-invests-650000-in-central-pa-startups.html

The SiliconCrossroads VCT founders  actually invested in Pennsylvania Startup eschoolmall ( now esm solutions ) some years ago  http://www.esmsolutions.com/SchoolDistrictsSolutions.aspx

New York ( not far away ) is also a recognised startup centre.

Washington is a place that we British can easily get confused about ( although most of us recognise Washington D.C. we may not know exactly where it is - just West of New York ) and there are 2 or 3 Washingtons in the U.S.

Similarly many Americans probably don’t know where Birmingham or Staffordshire is ( a couple of hundred miles North of London would probably work - which would be a short car ride for many Americans ) so it is great news that the Saxon Hoard is increasing awareness of Staffordshire and the Silicon Crossroads area ( Lichfield, Tamworth, Walsall and Sutton Coldfield ).

Silicon Crossroads is the High Tech. business area established between Lichfield, Tamworth, Sutton Coldfield and Walsall in Staffordshire, England, U.K. The crossroads referred to is the ancient crossroads of Watling Street ( the A5 ) and Rykneld Street ( the A38 ) which cross one another just below Lichfield.

Notably Tamworth is dominated by Tamworth Castle and Lichfield by Lichfield Cathedral and these are ancient seats of power in Middle England.

The recent discovery of the Staffordshire Hoard may well add to the evidence for the Lichfield and Tamworth area being an area of influence and innovation and Silicon Crossroads and the Silicon Crossroads VCT continue this tradition.

The Silicon Crossroads VCT is a High Tech. Investment fund with a particular focus on areas like Social Media, Inbound Marketing and Cloud Computing.

We have established strong connections with entrepreneurs, business angels and venture capital funds in some of the main innovation areas in the U.S. and Canada like Silicon Valley, Boston, New York, Vancouver, Austin, Toronto and other emerging High Tech Innovation areas like Baltimore.

Aside from Early Stage funding the VCT provides support for start up and early stage companies from the U.S. and the U.K. Included in our support services is ” Outsourced Business Development ” to assist companies to identify target customers and sectors  and to establish contact with them using state of the art Marketing techniques like Inbound Marketing, the creation of Internet Marketing Ecosystems and therefore the use of Social Media and Social Business Media.

It became obvious a few years ago that the rise of companies like Salesforce ( SaaS CRM ) , Google ( Search and Social Media ), Facebook ( Social Media ) and Twitter ( Social Media )  would give rise to other companies like HubSpot ( Inbound Marketing ) , Hootsuite ( Monitoring multiple social media channels )  and Twylah ( Twitter brand pages ).

It was less obvious that there would be such huge angel and venture capital investment in the U.S. but there has been and it is only increasing.

There has also been a revolution ( from necessity ) in funding methods for start ups in the U.S. with companies like KickStarter and the concentration of Angels and so called Super Angels onto lists like AngelList.

In addition companies like SecondMarket have created liquidity in markets like pre-IPO shares and debt.

You can get more information on some of these companies via this blog and my Twylah page   http://www.twylah.com/cwindley.

This is a holding page for more information on Silicon Crossroads and the Silicon Crossroads VCT and websites, blogs and Twylah pages will be developed for these over time.

My contact information is on this blog on the Contact page.

Lichfield businesses have been subjected to an incredible outbreak of Wahooliganism. Wahooliganism first emerged in Minneapolis in the U.S. last year and then spread globally via highly connected individuals and internet influencers.

It gained serious Klout along the way but suffered a setback in early February. It is expected to re-emerge over the coming weeks stronger than ever and businesses in Lichfield and indeed globally are advised to prepare.

What is Wahooliganism ??

A short description proffered by Wahooly founder Dana Severson is  ” Accelerating Start-up growth through online influence. “

There’s a good description of Wahooly in TechCrunch here:

http://techcrunch.com/2012/02/01/wahooly-launches-its-crowdfunding-experiment-with-first-3-startups-ready-for-social-capital/

Wahooly ( a start-up itself ) is helping it’s first 3 start-up’s ( actually on the website there are 4 now - http://wahooly.com/ ) to gain traction by having ” influential people ” invest time, effort and skills in them and promote them on a global basis.

Does this actually work ???

Well I think it does. Word of Mouth Marketing,Networking and Referrals are established ways of ” getting the word out ” and ” growing the business “.

For those of you who have read Gladwell’s ” The Tipping Point ” you will know that “The success of any kind of social epidemic is heavily dependent on the involvement of people with a particular and rare set of social gifts.” These people are Connectors, Mavens and Salespeople.

According to Gladwell, economists call this the “80/20 Principle, which is the idea that in any situation roughly 80 percent of the ‘work’ will be done by 20 percent of the participants.”

The 20% are defined by Klout ( arguably ) as those who have a Klout score of greater than 45. ( Klout is only one company that is measuring Internet ” influence ).

This is not really rocket science - you get influential people ( in real life and virtual life ) to promote your company, products and services and this helps you grow your business.

Let’s take two examples:

Twylah ( http://www.twylah.com/ )

Twylah is a company that wants to take your Twitter Tweets and ” Tell your story and get you noticed ” by making an awesome looking website out of your Tweets. Twylah is based in San Franciso and is a start-up with co-founders Kelly and Eric Kim. Kelly is the community manager for Twylah and the marketing face of @Twylah.

Twylah has some VERY famous clients already ( see http://www.twylah.com/featured ) which include Lady GaGa, Britney Spears, Bon Jovi and Arnold Shwarzenegger !! This might give you the impression that only famous people need apply ! Here is David Skok of Matrix Partners Twylah page http://www.twylah.com/bostonvc/topics/matrix ( A Boston based VC investor  ) and here’s my Twylah page  http://www.twylah.com/cwindley .

From small beginnings Twylah has spread globally - mainly by using Twitter. Kelly has some 13,000 or so followers on Twitter. By picking certain people ( famous, influential, interesting ) Kelly has spread the word on Twylah and now Twylah users are spreading the word further.

Coco Meli Bakery ( http://www.cocomelibakery.co.uk/ )

More locally, Meli Nicolaou, of Coco Meli Bakery is using various means to promote her Artisan Bakery business and newly launched refreshments van at Trent Valley Railway Station.

Meli (  @CocoMeliBakery on Twitter )

has a relatively small ( well at least to Kelly !! ) Twitter follower base ( 500 odd ) but she has used this to help spread the word about her business. She now has a Twylah page http://www.twylah.com/CocoMeliBakery .

Again, physically and online she is spreading the word and others are spreading the word for her - some of them are influential people.

The involvement of influential people is having an actual positive effect on the growth of the business. What is the value of a new Twylah customer or a new Coco Meli Bakery customer ?? I don’t know but Eric Kim’s background is in the monetisation of Internet platforms and to him ( and the industry he has worked in for the last 10 years or so ) each follower, retweeter, circler, favouriter, liker and email address has a dollar or pound ( or part of ) value !!

Hootsuite is one of a number of applications that now exist for people to monitor relevant activity on a number of social media networks simultaneously like Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and Google +. Competitors to Hootsuite include TweetDeck, PeopleBrowser and CoTweet. One of the major concerns for investors considering investing in HootSuite was it’s location in Vancouver, Canada.

You may know that Vancouver is  the home of many start-ups lots of which are ” high Tech. ” including HootSuite. HootSuite was ranked in the top 10 at the time of this survey.

Vancouver is a beautiful City located on the West Coast of Canada and a 100 or so miles away from Seattle, U.S. - the home of Microsoft and the original home of Starbucks Coffee . I have been to Vancouver a number of times - mainly to ski in Whistler. I sent my son David there to learn about Internet Marketing and I will also always remember it as the home of ” those otters “. You know the cute ones that float around holding hands and have over 17 Million hits on YouTube !! We tried to get David to visit the otters in Vancouver Aquarium but he never quite made it. He did however fly out to Vancouver and back on his own.

Anyway - back to HootSuite. One of the downsides identified with HootSuite by the venture capitalists, as mentioned earlier, was that it was based in Vancouver.  You can’t really believe that Vancouver is viewed ( by some ) as a backwater but it is. It’s vibrant start-up community is a drop in the ocean when compared with e.g. San Francisco, New York and Boston.

The biggest problem perceived ??? How would they get the talent needed ??

In fact this “disadvantage” turned out to be an advantage ….

“Up there, surrounded by quality dev talent with limited competition, HootSuite has been able to attract A+ people at a fraction of the cost of its competitors. This advantage has only grown as HootSuite now is one of the top tech companies to work for in Canada and can pull from across the entire country. ”

Similarly a ” Silicon Crossroads ” in Lichfield would be perceived as ” nowhere ” by the High Tech. community but it has major advantages in the talent pool, the location, access to transport and many other areas.

2007 article about Vancouver’s High Tech. start-up’s:

http://montrealtechwatch.com/2007/08/07/vancouver-canadas-greatest-start-up-city/

Well actually this lie about Web Marketing was not heard in Lichfield but received in an email from U.S. Marketing guru, Charlie Cook, whose blogsite and article with a title similar to mine is here . Hopefully Charlie will be o.k. with me borrowing from his email ( initially ) and blog post.

You really want to take the time to follow this link ( here it is again )

http://www.marketingforsuccess.com/blog/web-marketing/the-biggest-lie/

and read it before coming back to my blog post.

The gist of it is this: Business people realise that they have to invest considerable amounts of money, time, skill, knowledge and effort into” bricks and mortar sites ” like for example a new restaurant in a chain of restaurants or a new office location in an expanding company but they think that they can open up the Internet or online part of a company for nothing and in a short space of  time, with no skills or knowledge and little effort.

They then wonder why it has not worked.

Charlie says “ Isabela, a successful restaurant chain owner,  knows that when she opens a new restaurant, it’s a big investment. On average it takes, $494,888 to open a restaurant. Yes almost a half million dollars. Of course, within 18 months the typical restaurant is grossing $1,171,629 a year and making a profit of $91,103 – which isn’t bad at all.

How about Isabela’s online business? How much did she spend to get it up and running? Practically nothing – and no surprise it makes practically nothing. ”

I often say to people ” Treat your website like an online sales team ” . Now guess what - a successful physical sales team takes  all the things to build that I have mentioned earlier money ( and some ! ), time, skill, knowledge, experience and effort. Not to mention the fact that you need tools, processes and systems in place to monitor the performance and effectiveness of your salesforce. Those of you that have built a salesforce
( accountancy, law practice etc etc ) know that getting the right team is an extremely difficult and time consuming process.

Charlie reckoned that Isabela’s Internet business could be making $200,000.00 for her but was actually making virtually nothing. This is like a salesperson carrying a ( profit target ) of 2 restaurants worth. To generate $200K the investment would be huge.

I whizzed Charlie’s email off to one of the Director’s of a company that I work with and he came straight back with:

” I always say to the retailers I speak to that want to be e-tailers that the web store needs to be treated like any other store, and will require time and investment if it’s going to be a success on the same scale. “

So, maybe this will help ?? When you are thinking about starting an online business think about it like opening up a new restaurant, a new store a new branch or building a new salesforce and maybe you will get things into perspective !!

High Tech. Start-up’s are booming in the U.S. with Boston, New York and Silicon Valley all very active and there are many U.S. start-up’s looking at establishing a European office. Could Lichfield a.k.a. Silicon Crossroads in Staffordshire dare to dream that it might host some of these start-up’s ?

Friends of mine established Leap the Pond some years ago in order to assist start-up’s gain a successful foothold from the U.S. to the U.K. and vice versa and also from Asia to the U.K. and America and vice versa.

A while back I wrote this blog

http://mandarainmaker.co.uk/wordpress/2011/09/27/celtic-tiger-awakes-and-starts-tweeting-about-hi-tech/

as I was asked to suggest a suitable European location for a U.S. software company that I knew.

Right at the end you will see mention of an accounting practice called the ” Double Irish and a Dutch Sandwich ” fully described here

http://www.joe.ie/news-politics/current-affairs/irish-move-to-save-twitter-53-per-cent-in-tax-0016130-1

which describes the tax savings achieved by Google and to be achieved by Twitter by having offices in Southern Ireland and Luxembourg.

Like it or not the ” financial parameters ” are going to have a significant influence on where a foreign company bases itself in Europe.

Lichfield can do no better than London in influencing the tax position of the U.K. mainland. The so called ” Silicon Roundabout ” in London will have to put up with U.k. Tax laws although it is interesting to note that Google also has offices in London and is taking more space in Silicon Roundabout:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15088359

Recognised ” High Tech. ” areas in the U.K. include: London, M4 corridor, Cambridge, Oxford and Silicon Glen, Scotland. There has been an effort to make the M42/M5 corridor High Tech. and also Telford hosts a number of High Tech. companies.

When you look at Europe from the U.S. you probably have a different perspective and London, Luxembourg, Belgium, Holland and Barcelona in Spain all seem to figure high in Americans minds.

I.D.A. Ireland ( now known as the ” Silicon Republic ” !! ) is very active in the U.S. with ” salespeople ” based in Boston, New York and the West Coast yet it does not necessarily get considered despite having many high tech companies based there.

http://www.idaireland.com/

This video by the C.E.O. of IDA Ireland spells out a lot of the criteria

http://www.idaireland.com/news-media/videos/index.xml?bclid=66038357001&bctid=1148962666001

The Tax Environment

The Business offer ( Incentives to base your H.Q. there )

The Talent Pool

The Track Record

Proximity to other ” synergistic ”  businesses.

Transport links

Despite very tough economics in Ireland, or perhaps because of it, I.D.A. Ireland has got all it’s ducks in a row and does a massively professional job of getting inward investment.

Lichfield has to live with the tax regime, as does London.

The business offer would have to be very good.

The Talent Pool, whilst small is there.

It has little track record and not many existing businesses to be synergistic with. There is however a talent pool skilled in web design and S.E.O.

It has fabulous transport links.

It is a beautiful location, great lifestyle and has an opportunity with the ” Saxon Hoard ” to become much better known around the world.

With a lot of work and commitment Lichfield could become a High Tech base.

N.B. This post in the Guardian about The Lichfield Blog

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2010/nov/22/hyperlocal-media-blogging

shows the depth of the social media knowledge in the area.

Information about Tech City, London : http://www.ukti.gov.uk/investintheuk/sectoropportunities/ict/item/124866.html

Start up Wahooly starts tomorrow ( Tuesday 31st January ) having used Klout to select it’s members. I realise that this is is all about as clear as mud at the moment !

Let’s start with Klout which is a company ( one of a few that are doing this ) that essentially grades your Internet influence. Here is Klout about Klout:

http://klout.com/#/understand

” Klout was founded in 2008 to help you measure and leverage your influence. We believe influence is the ability to drive action. For example, Oprah’s opinion on literature has inspired millions to read titles from her book club. But you don’t have to be Oprah to have influence. You influence your friend when she listens to a song you recommend on Facebook. You influence your coworker when he checks out an article you posted on LinkedIn and shares it with someone else. Social actions like these are a reflection of influence. ”

Klout uses a ” secret algorithm ” to measure people and brand influence.

A few month’s ago this algorithm was ” modified ” and a lot of people’s ” Klout score ” changed ( many for the worse ) generating considerable reaction from Klout ” members “.

A lot of people say ” Who are Klout and what right do they have to rank my influence ? ” I have my own issues with Klout including the fact that they have a lot of technical bugs that impact people’s scores.

Anyway - let’s get on to Wahooly. Wahooly is a start-up that aims to help start-ups by recruiting ” influential ” people to promote start-ups that they wish to support. In return the influencers get equity ( shares ) in the start-up. So, this is like hiring an Internet Marketing Expert ( Social Media Marketer ) and PR person and paying them in equity rather than hard cash.

Will it work ?? We shall see.

To be a member of Wahooly you needed to have a Klout score of 45 or above ( mine was at the time of selection but has fallen slightly since. I have been as high as 67 in the past ).

More on Wahooly’s use of Klout here:

http://www.launch.is/blog/wahooly-uses-klout-to-add-400-influencers-daily-who-earn-equ.html

I am therefore a founder member of Wahooly and a Wahooligan ( as they call it ).

Given that it has been very hard to raise start-up capital in the last few years there have been many new initiatives to help start-ups get going. Equity for influence is just the latest of them. There have, for example , been a whole host of crowd financing ( investing small amounts of money for small amounts of equity ) initiatives.

Obviously Wahooly has a presence on the main social media platforms:

Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/wahooly?ref=ts&sk=wall

https://www.facebook.com/groups/Wahooligans/

Twitter

https://twitter.com/#!/TeamWahooly

Google +

https://plus.google.com/u/0/105465481469156419624/posts

Linkedin

etc

It is going to be an interesting experiment !!

If you live in the Lichfield, Staffordshire area and are interested in learning more about Internet Marketing Strategy and Strategies then please feel free to contact me via this website or one of the Social Networks listed below. ( You can Google me for more ).

One of the objectives of Internet Marketing is to be found for relevant e.g. Google searches like ” Internet Marketing Strategy ” . If you are reading this then you found it during some search or other for something like the phrase I have mentioned. I did not pay to be listed in a Directory or to have an advert on Google ( Top results or right hand side results ). I simply wrote about this subject.

I have been an Information Technology professional since leaving the Navy in the 80’s and have experience of sales, marketing and business strategy.

Terry Herbert with some of the Saxon Hoard.

Internet Marketing has been a passion of mine for the last 10 years or so since I realised just how many people were using search engines like Google to find information, products and services.

I came to the conclusion many years ago that we tend to lag 6-12 months behind what the U.S. is doing ( although not everything is invented in the U.S.  !! ) and so I have deliberately made and developed contacts in the U.S. so that I could keep up to date with the real cutting edge of Internet Marketing. So, for example I was a beta member of Google + which grew out of the West coast of the U.S. This means that I feel connected to Silicon Valley even though I have not lived there ( I have visited on a couple of occasions ). I guess I am missing out on some of the Silicon Valley action but I love Lichfield and Staffordshire.

Other companies which typify what I regard as the leading edge in global Internet Marketing include Boston based  HubSpot and more recently San Francisco based Twylah.

There are a number of Marketing and Internet Marketing posts on this blogsite that might help you ( Try searching for Marketing Newsletters as a start ) and I am very happy to discuss specific thoughts, issues and challenges directly.

Social Network Links

https://plus.google.com/100770362378770488768/posts

https://www.facebook.com/chris.windley

https://twitter.com/#!/cwindley

http://www.twylah.com/cwindley

http://www.linkedin.com/in/chriswindley

LMS Capital plc capitulated to the Rayne Concert Party demand to keep Robert Rayne on the Board of Directors and Head the ” Special Committee ”  tasked with winding down LMS Capital’s investments including 365itservices .co.uk with the following announcement:

25 November 2011

LMS CAPITAL PLC

BOARD CHANGES AND GENERAL MEETING

LMS Capital plc (“LMS” or the “Company”) announces that its board of directors (the “Board”) has

agreed a process  to reconstitute the Board.  This process, which is intended to ensure that  the

Company has an independent Board in place to oversee its wind-down in the best interests of all

shareholders, and to reflect good corporate governance, has been established with the Concert Party

described in the Company’s circular to shareholders dated 7 November 2011.

A Committee of the Board (the  “Special Committee”) will be appointed to manage the reconstitution

and will comprise Richard Christou, Robert Rayne and Mark Sebba. Mark Sebba will chair the Special

Committee.

The Special Committee will effect the search for two new independent non-executive directors with

the assistance of search consultants.

Upon the appointment of the two new directors, John Barnsley and David Verey will stand down from

the Board, and Robert Rayne will stand down as Chairman but remain on the Board. Richard Christou

will replace Robert Rayne as Chairman.

On the basis of these arrangements and the Board’s support of Robert Rayne, the Concert Party has

withdrawn its request that shareholders be  asked whether they agree that he remain on the Board.

Accordingly, the third resolution relating to Robert Rayne set out in the Company’s circular of 7

November 2011 will not be considered at the general meeting convened for 11.00 a.m. on 30

November 2011 and shareholders will only be asked to vote in relation to the two resolutions to

approve the Company’s proposed wind-down strategy. The Board is unanimously recommending that

shareholders vote in favour of this strategy.

Enquiries

Quayle Munro: 020 7907 4200

Colin La Fontaine Jackson/Andrew Tuckey

Matrix Corporate Capital LLP

This really seals the fate of 365 ITMS Limited  and 365it services.co.uk which will now be broken up and sold as soon as practicable.

LMS CAPITAL PLC

Shareholders General Meeting – Poll Results

On 30 November 2011, LMS Capital plc held the Shareholders General Meeting requisitioned by the Rayne Concert Party. The results of the voting by poll on the resolutions

put to the meeting are listed below. All resolutions were passed by the required majority.

Resolution

For* Against* Withheld**

Votes % Votes % Votes

1. Approve the new investment policy 242,375,643 97.79 5,474,039 2.21 50,206

2. Approve the orderly winding down of the Company 226,548,610 91.39 21,334,453 8.61 65,702

* The ‘For’ and ‘Against’ votes include those votes giving the Company Secretary discretion.

** The votes ‘Withheld’ are not counted towards the votes cast at the General Meeting

Resolution 3, as originally included in the Notice of General Meeting dated 7 November 2011, was withdrawn by the Rayne Concert Party on 25 November

2011 and was therefore not put to the vote at the Meeting.

The Company’s issued share capital, as at 30 November 2011, is 272,674,285 ordinary shares of 10p each.

365it services.co.uk

Peter MacLean, who sometimes refers to himself as a Director and other times as a Non-executive Chairman of 365iT plc, has called a General Meeting for Ordinary Shareholders on the 12th December 2011 at 10.00 in the company’s offices’s at 4 Cartel Business Centre, Stroudley Road, Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG24 8FW.

This is to change the name of 365iT plc to Fox IT Holding plc and to re-register as a limited company.

Now, 365iT and Impera plc shareholders must be asking themselves how it is that they are invited to discuss and approve a change of name and company status but they didn’t get to vote on the sale of most of the companies that 365iT plc owned to LMS Capital; didn’t get to vote on who got their loan notes paid off and who didn’t and also didn’t get to vote on the fact that the name of the company would need to be changed to keep LMS Capital happy.

They were also not informed that these companies were being sold to LMS Capital at a time when approximately 37% of the shareholders ( known as the Raynes Party ) were asking that no further investments be made and the company split up. ( There will be a blog on what has happened at LMS Capital shortly ).

We can assume that MacLean thinks that he was acting within company law, the articles of association etc etc when he made all these decisions. Time will tell about that.

One of the good things about this General Meeting is that it gives oridinary shareholders the opportunity to meet one another and to discuss the recent events orchestrated by MacLean.

Business Health Warning !!

My advice to you for the future is:

Don’t invest in any company run by Peter MacLean.

Don’t sell your company to any company that MacLean is involved in.

The other ” Directors ” ( albeit non-executive ) of 365iT plc at the moment are Derek King ( also a Director of North West Equity and South East Growth Fund Managers Limited ) and Pieter Hooft ( also a Director of 365 ITMS Limited and others ). Presumably Mr Gourlay of Sussex Place  ( and others ) has resigned ??

Presumably Hooft was the contact at LMS Capital that was agreeing to buy the 365iT companies that were sold whilst LMS Capital itself was being asked to stop investing and split itself up and sell each company. ( In fact this is now the agreed strategy for LMS Capital - no further investments and a split up asap ).

More as we get it ……