25 March 2020
@HybridanLLP
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Shearwater Group 209p £46.2m (LON:SWG)
The organisational resilience group, provides an update in relation to measures taken by the Company in response to COVID-19 and on trading during March 2020.
The significant majority of Shearwater's employees and customers are now working remotely.
Following extensive stress-testing of its network access, everyday business tools and applications, the Group confirms that it is operating effectively and providing its services to its customers without interruption.
During March 2020, the universally substantial increase in remote working has resulted in group company SecurEnvoy experiencing an increase in demand for its security software products and this increased level of interest has resulted in a number of new contract wins and existing contract upgrades for its SecurIdentity MFA multi-factor authentication ( "MFA") software solution.
The Company is greatly encouraged by the increased interest in its software products and has yet to see any significant impact on profitability or cash flow as a result of COVID-19. The Group looks forward to updating shareholders in a planned trading update during April 2020.
Silence Therapeutics 497p £390m (LON:SLN)
R&D Update. This follows today's announcement that the Company will receive a $60m cash payment and a further $20m equity investment from AstraZeneca.
Due to the significant strengthening of the Company's balance sheet, the Board has taken the decision to accelerate SLN360, an Lp(a) targeting siRNA for the potential treatment of cardiovascular disease. The asset has been re-allocated as Silence's highest priority development programme as a result of the high and prevalent unmet medical need and the excellent preclinical profile. The Company intends to submit an Investigational New Drug (IND) application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) later this year and thereafter commence a first in man study with a view to generating interim data around the middle of 2021.
For SLN124, in view of the COVID-19 outbreak and to ensure the integrity of safety monitoring procedures for patients, Silence Has decided to pause patient recruitment under the current protocol.
Blackbird 9.5p £31.9m (LON:BIRD)
The developer and seller of the market-leading cloud video editing platform, announced today that A+E Networks® will double the volume edited through the Blackbird platform to both enable a significant expansion of remote video production capability, while ensuring the overall safety of its editors who will now be able to work even more effectively, remotely.
A+E Networks, a joint venture between Hearst and Disney, has a portfolio of global brands that includes A&E®, HISTORY®, Lifetime®, LMN®, fyi® and Viceland®. The international media network first incorporated Blackbird within its infrastructure for a range of key cloud video production workflows in June 2019 - delivering major productivity enhancements across its operations.
This latest expansion sees A+E Networks double the volume of file-based content available to its production teams for access through Blackbird. The visibility, immediacy and management of A+E Network's entire video archive will be significantly accelerated for the repurposing of content. Production teams will use Blackbird to rapidly ingest, view, edit and publish content using a choice of hybrid workflows - on-premise through the Blackbird cloud as well as on the Amazon Web Services (AWS) public cloud.
Ramsdens Holdings 92.5p £28.5m (LON:RFX)
Ramsdens, the diversified financial services provider and retailer, has noted the recent announcement by the UK Government regarding the closure of non-essential stores. As a result, effective from yesterday, the Group closed all its stores in the UK until further notice.
As stated in the Group's trading update on 18 March 2020, Ramsdens has a strong balance sheet, including approximately £10m of cash and an undrawn £10m revolving credit facility. The Group welcomes the support measures for businesses outlined by the UK Government so far and plans to utilise those measures that are applicable to the Group. The Group will provide a further update as and when appropriate.
Peter Kenyon, CEO of Ramsdens, commented:
"The safety and wellbeing of our customers, colleagues and the wider community remains our top priority and we are doing what is best by them. We have been following Government guidance throughout this unprecedented period and, following the most recent Government instructions, yesterday we closed our shops until further notice. We look forward to once again opening our doors and serving all the local communities where we operate. Until that time, our jewellery website will remain active for our customers to browse our extensive range of new and second-hand jewellery and luxury brand watches."
Ncondezi Energy 3.8p £12.35m (LON:NCCL)
General update on its power tariff finalisation and submission process for the integrated Ncondezi 300MW coal fired power project and coal mine in Tete, Mozambique .
Highlights :
· Project Financial Model now in final form and awaiting final approvals from the Company's Board of Directors and its Partners to be submitted to Electricidade de Moçambique
· Tariff submission remains on track for Q1 2020
· Proposals under review to provide additional capital to cover working capital costs beyond Q2 2020
Given the uncertainty and rapidly changing nature of the situation, Ncondezi is working to protect its cash flow by pro-actively managing its capital expenditure and working capital as well as identifying opportunities for cost savings that will not impact the long-term success of the Company.
The Company currently has adequate cash resources to cover corporate costs until Q2 2020 (subject to the shareholder loan extension). We are actively exploring a number of funding and working capital solutions beyond this period. A number of financing proposals have been received and are currently under review.
Novacyt 167.5p £113.4m (LON:NCYT)
The international specialist in clinical diagnostics, announces that Primerdesign, its molecular diagnostics division, has signed a global distribution agreement for its COVID-19 test with Bruker-Hain Diagnostics, the molecular diagnostics products business unit of Bruker Corporation (Bruker).
Novacyt's real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) COVID-2019 IVD-CE test is validated for use on Bruker-Hain Diagnostics' GenoXtract® automated nucleic acid extraction device and associated extraction kits. It is under validation on Bruker's new FluoroCycler® XT PCR instrument, allowing Bruker to provide a full solution from automated extraction to result. Bruker has already initiated shipments of the Primerdesign test into Spain, France, Germany and UK.
The Company also announces that the Republic of the Philippines Department of Health Food and Drug Administration has approved the Company's COVID-19 test for commercial use, effective immediately.
Yourgene 17p £105m (LON:YGEN)
The international molecular diagnostics group, announces the signing of an agreement for contract manufacturing services with Novacyt S.A., an international specialist in clinical diagnostics, to support the production of COVID-19 diagnostic tests developed by Primerdesign, Novacyt's molecular diagnostics division.
Yourgene will make use of its state-of-the-art manufacturing facility at Citylabs in Manchester, UK, to work alongside Novacyt to ramp-up production of their COVID-19 test. The first batches are expected to be shipped from the Citylabs site over the next few weeks. In the interest of speed, the Company will initially manufacture critical components for Primerdesign's COVID-19 test. The two companies may subsequently seek to expand the agreement to utilize Yourgene's ability to produce final versions of the COVID-19 testing kits.
SIMEC AtlantisEnergy 8p £34.33m (LON:SAE)
The global developer, owner and operator of sustainable energy projects, announced that MeyGen Plc has been awarded a £1.54m grant from the Scottish Government's Saltire Tidal Energy Challenge Fund to develop a subsea tidal turbine connection hub for the next phase of development of the MeyGen tidal power array, the world's largest tidal stream power project.
Cadence Minerals 3.225p £3.4m (LON:KDNC)
Notes yesterday's update from Macarthur Minerals (TSX-V: MMS), that it has been awarded a grant valued at $85,000 from the Western Australian Government to support drilling of a diamond drill hole at its Moonshine North Nickel Prospect, located within its Lake Giles Iron Project in Western Australia.
Head Chefs
Derren Nathan
0203 764 2344
derren.nathan@hybridan.com
Niall Pearson
0203 764 2343
niall.pearson@hybridan.com