Parkiet: acquisition decision to be taken this quarter

Tuesday, 27 April 2010 19:47

Arteria is close to complete the acquisition of a company engaged in, among other things, selling telecommunications services. “Essentially, we have agreed all the terms of the transaction. We have yet to arrange a meeting or two in order to verify whether or not we made the right assumptions,” says Wojciech Bieńkowski, President of Arteria, a company operating in the sales outsourcing segment. He adds that the final decision to go ahead with the acquisition should be taken before the end of this quarter.

Arteria, which is a listed company, also has plans to strengthen its position in the financial intermediation market (until recently it only sold products offered by the Citi Handlowy bank). “We’re in talks with three companies operating in this sector,” says Mr Bieńkowski. “Now it’s the right time to make acquisitions because many financial intermediaries are in a difficult position. Those who operated sales outlets have been hit the hardest,” he adds.

Bieńkowski makes no secret of the fact that Arteria’s first quarter results aren’t impressive. Did the company slip into the red in the first quarter? “It’s too early to tell, but I don’t think it did,” he says. The first quarter results were also affected, particularly by costs incurred in launching the bond issue and expanding the group’s operations in the financial intermediation segment,” he further explains. Early second quarter wasn’t very successful, either. “Because of national mourning, April was one week shorter,” says Mr Bieńkowski. On the other hand, the group’s results will be improved, among other things, by a contract awarded to Arteria by Telekomunikacja Polska. “We’ve already started fulfilling the contract,” says Bieńkowski.

In the year 2009, the group generated revenues of PLN 131.5 million, and net earnings of PLN 4.2 million. The Company has set itself the target of increasing turnover by several dozen per cent per year. Profit margins are expected to eventually double. In this quarter Arteria is going to convene a General Shareholders’ Meeting which will take decisions regarding an option scheme for managers. Arteria will also provide guidelines for the scheme relating to forecast results for the years 2010–2012. “The EPS will be the main indicator,” says Arteria’s President.

Source: GG Parkiet