Last hurrah for a bold venture

By IRENE CHAPPLE

The pall of death hung over eVentures' final general meeting, with subdued shareholders readying themselves for the company's almost inevitable funeral in August.

Craig Heatley, who has been on an overseas trip with his family and flew into New Zealand this week, donned a white shirt but neglected the formality of a tie when he chaired yesterday's meeting.

Just over 20 shareholders who joined him listened quietly as Heatley explained that last month's decision to liquidate appeared the best option for the company which had struggled since its inception in 2000.

The company's first-year loss was $3.9 million on revenue of $2.6 million. Last year's loss improved to $926,000 on revenue of $4.4 million.

The company has remained cash-rich, with $31.3 million of cash at December last year, but did not make the number of investments originally planned.

Heatley said there was no guarantee eVentures' liquidation was the best option, but if it were to continue it might incur expensive overheads which the company wasn't prepared to swallow.

Heatley, who owns 44.4 per cent of the company, will net a fat capital gain if the liquidation is approved in August. As co-founder of eVentures, Heatley acquired his shares at 15c each, so the move earns him a profit of $7.2 million.

Liquidating the company will give Heatley and the other remaining shareholders an estimated return of between 33c and 35c a share.

That was bad news for small shareholders who bought into eVentures in the initial public offering at 60c a share, but dissent appears to have been all but wiped out by Heatley's subsequent offer to spend $500,000 of his own profits to fully compensate original investors.

Heatley's offer applied only to shareholders who acquired their shares in eVentures' initial public offering, which restricted purchases to no more than 10,000 shares, and who remained on the register.

More than a third of eligible shareholders have already accepted the offer, which remains open until July 12. Shareholders who bought big blocks of shares in the initial float, notably Telecom, Todd Capital and The Warehouse with five million shares each, and any who bought subsequently would miss out on the 60c a share.

Other details for liquidation of the company are still being worked through, including withdrawal from its lease obligations.

Heatley has previously said his profit of $7 million-plus would be put into a trust aimed at helping child-based charities in New Zealand and overseas.

He was reluctant to talk about the trust yesterday, saying it was a family decision that had nothing to do with eVentures and was simply an organised way of helping charities.