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Vitesse Media tanks as losses grow, FD quits
(WebFG News) - Digital media and events business Vitesse Media warned investors on Tuesday that annual losses would be bigger than hoped and that its finance director was leaving.
The AIM-quoted publisher of What Investment and Information Age and organiser of the Quoted Company Awards and Women in IT Awards said it had failed to generate enough higher-margin media sales, particularly in the final quarter of the 12 months to 31 March.
This, plus a heightened level of investment poured into strengthening the company's "infrastructure", will mean Vitesse will report a loss before exceptionals of approximately £380,000 for the year, a significant widening of the £11,700 loss posted for the 14 months ended 31 March 2017.
Exceptional costs will add roughly another £125,000 to total losses as a result of restructuring and certain professional fees and costs incurred in exploring potential acquisitions, some of which the company said still remain active.
Vitesse has continued to invest in the improvement of its websites, all of which will be relaunched in the next six months, and supplementing its senior management team, including hiring a new head of media sales who joins on 24 April.
Simon Stilwell, the co-founder of broker Liberum who joined as chief executive of Vitesse in August last year, said, "The company continues to make substantial operational progress as we put in place the managerial and technical platform to enable us to significantly scale the business. We are in good shape to execute on our ambitious growth plans; developing new revenue streams and building the business both organically and through acquisition."
Separately, given the changing nature and scale of the business, Edward Riddell, the group's finance director, will resign as a director of Vitesse to "pursue other business interests" following the publication of the company's audited full-year financial statements.
As of 0910 BST, shares had tanked 28.92% to 2.31p.