Member Info for jange

Shares in WANdisco lifted sharply as the group launched its big data platform WANdisco Distro on Friday. The product is described by the company as "a production ready Apache Hadoop 2 Distribution platform for Big Data". Development was led by Dr Konstantin Boudnik, WANdisco's Director of Big Data Distribution, who joined the company in January from Karmasphere. According to the company, the product's competitive advantage is in its ability to manage, protect and defend mission critical data centre installations.

Meanwhile, nine leases were renewed at a combined rent of £94,190, representing an average uplift of 3% and 1.6% above market rent. Nick Gregory, London Shopping REIT's Joint Chief Executive Officer, said: "The portfolio continues to perform well and we have leveraged the expertise of our specialist management skills in order to bring down the void rate to its lowest level over the last four years. "We have also continued to make good progress in growing rents through rent reviews and lease renewals, achieving these at significant premiums to Market Rent."

UK real estate investment trust, Local Shopping REIT, has reported a 9.0 per cent average uplift on rent reviews in the four months to January 31st, an interim management statement has disclosed. The group reported an annualised rent roll from the core portfolio maintained at £16m. It stated that 38 units had been let since September 30th at a total rent of £342,386 per annum. Rent reviews were completed on 69 units, increasing rental income by £88,421 per annum, representing an average uplift of 9.0% and a 9.5% premium-to-Market rent.

City of London Investment Trust's share price was down 0.18% to 326.10p at 11:42 on Friday.

With regard to the performance of specific stocks in the portfolio, he said: "Within the portfolio, particularly strong performances were achieved by newspaper distributor Smiths News where profits beat low expectations, IMI experiencing global demand for its industrial engineering products and the life assurers Aviva and Standard Life which benefited from improving equity markets."

City of London Investment Trust has reported a 'good performance' in the context of a mixed global economic environment, according to its half yearly report for the period ending December 31st. The company reported that it had produced a net asset value total return of 9.6%, 1.1% better than the size weighted average for the UK Growth & Income investment trust sector. The trust's performance was also 0.9 percentage points better than the FTSE All-Share Index, which produced a total return of 8.7%. Philip Remnant, Chairman of the company, stated: "We benefited from gearing during the six months of between 8% and 10% as well as below average exposure to the oil sector, which was a poor performer."

Essentially the reasons behind today’s improved outlook comes down to better visibility and a belief that the remainder of the year won’t be as volatile or as poor as last year – when demand failed to pick up follow the summertime lull in Europe. Hoyer explained that Ruukki’s operations are currently focussed on the production of speciality alloys, which have more stable niche markets. As such he says Ruukki’s operations are mainly being driven by demand for specific alloys, and production is being guided by the group’s sales team. Ruukki reported revenues in the first six months of 2012 of €78 million versus €79.3 million in the first half of last year, while earnings increased to €6.7 million compared with €5.1 million in the corresponding period of 2011. In the second quarter of this year production decreased by 20.1 percent to 74,181 tonnes tonnes, mainly due to the shut-down of two of the four furnaces of the Mogale alloys plant in South Africa in response to power constraints in the country and an electricity buyback programme by power group Eskom. Ruukki’s cash flow from operations was much improved at 13.5 million, compared with minus €5.8 million in the same period of last year, and at the end of the year it had €45 million.

Ruukki (LON:RKKI) today upgraded its outlook for the remainder of the year as it said the previously volatile ferrochrome market is stabilising. It said full-year revenues are now expected to be in-line with last year. This marks a notable turnaround after it warned of uncertain conditions in the first quarter of the year. In a conference call today chief executive Thomas Hoyer said: “The recent volatility in ferrochrome prices has been huge, but when you look at realised prices in the physical market this volatility is decreasing,” he said. “It seems that the market is finding a bottom in terms of pricing, though it is still a weak market. And we are looking forward with slightly more positivity.” He stressed, however, that the seasonally-affected third quarter is always weaker than the rest of the year. And unlike other ferrochrome producers, Ruukki is not expecting, or banking on, a significant rally in prices the fourth quarter.

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The loss before tax for the full year 2012 is expected to be marginally higher than current market expectations for communications network specialist Norcon, an update issued by the company on Friday has disclosed. The AIM-listed company stated that market expectations had been reduced following the company's trading update on September 17th and its interim report for the six months to June 30th released on September 20th. On Friday, the company stated that turnover for the financial year was expected to be "in line with current market expectations". It said it was not expecting to pay a dividend for the financial year ending December 31st. Norcon's main activity is providing project, vendor performance management and outsourcing services for telecommunications operators.

Emerging markets potential Going forwards, he said emerging markets represented an exciting growth opportunity, with increasing interest being seen from key customers in the areas, particularly in Brazil. "We believe emerging markets represent an exciting growth opportunity for us, and are seeing increasing interest from key customers in these areas, in particular in Brazil, Latin America, India and other parts of Asia. "This fundraise provides us with the resources to move forward in developing those opportunities and we are confident that the massively smooth user experiences enabled by our unique technology platform, extensive mobile network operator relationships and industry leading customers provide us with a clear competitive edge in the fast growing mobile payments industry," he said.

Shares in AIM-listed mobile web payments and analytics company Bango rose on Friday morning after the company announced a 6.5m-pound share placing. The group reported that it had conducted a proposed placing with institutional investors of 3.3m new ordinary shares at 200p per share to raise �6.5m before expenses. The placing was oversubscribed, Bango reported, with support from both new and existing institutional investors. It said it intended to use the proceeds to be better positioned to take advantage of developing opportunities and increase its capability to underwrite emerging market opportunities. Ray Anderson, Chief Executive Officer of Bango, commented: "Bango has made significant progress through 2012 and into 2013, with a total reach now exceeding 1bn mobile phone users. "We have executed on our plan to support a significant scaling-up in future transaction volumes, making key hires to boost our executive and operational team and investing in our technology platform. We have also seen good development across our key metrics, with analytics transaction volume doubling again during 2012 and end user spend growth resuming towards the end of 2012 and into 2013.

AIM-listed technology group Tracsis has signed an agreement with a UK rail freight operator to supply a customised version of its TrainTRACS crew scheduling software. The contract is for the provision of software, support and additional development work and will run for three years with annual reviews. The transaction marks Tracsis' entry into the rail freight market. John McArthur, Chief Executive Officer of Tracsis, commented: "This contract is a significant milestone for Tracsis and demonstrates our long held belief that our planning software is applicable to other transport verticals. "The rail freight market holds a great opportunity for the group both in the UK and overseas and is a sector that is not burdened by the current hiatus relating to passenger franchising. We are confident this will be the first of a number of sales to freight operators, and hope to develop other complementary products to these customers in the fullness of time."

It stated that it intended that Trapoil would be the operator of the TET area, subject to the approval of the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), which remained a condition precedent to completion of the farm-in transaction. Mark Groves Gidney, Chief Executive Officer of Trapoil, commented: "The farm-in to the TET asset enables the group to secure operatorship, subject to DECC's approval, and therefore exercise greater control over the scheduling of our work programme. "In addition, this relatively straight forward gas development project, in conjunction with the promising exploration potential in the adjacent acreage, offers the prospect of attractive cash flow for the group in the medium term.

Independent oil and gas exploration company Trapoil has unveiled details of the farm-in to the Trent East Terrace (TET) Area, an operational update issued on Friday has disclosed. The AIM-listed company, which is focused on the UK Continental Shelf region of the North Sea, confirmed details of its farm-in to the Trent East Terrace area and provided an operational update in respect of certain of its planned exlporation wells. Trapoil stated that it had entered into a sale and purchase agreement to acquire a 33.33% working interest from Perenco UK in an area known as "License P.685" located in a region known as "Block 43/24a". Block 43/24a is located in the Silverpit Basin in the Southern North Sea and contains the company's Trent East gas discovery. Trapoil reported that it had committed to secure a drilling rig within six months for the planned TET appraisal well. It stated that it currently anticipated the company's share of the drilling costs would be approximately £5m as and when the well was drilled.

Khandelwal, an electrical engineering graduate from Mumbai, started his career in the energy field at Powergen UK in 1996 before he joined Shell as an investment advisor. He moved over Frontline Corporate services in London as a portfolio investment manager in 2006 and three years later jumped on board Jubilant.

Jubilant Energy announced Friday the resignation of Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Ajay Khandelwal. The oil and gas explorer gave no explanation for the exit saying only that he was leaving "by mutual agreement and immediate effect". The company said it has started the hunt for a new CEO and will provide an update in due course. In the meantime, Jubliant has set up a committee comprising of Chief Operating Officer, Ramesh Bhatia, and Chief Financial Officer, Vipul Agarwal, for the day to day running of business.

"Our technology was in a rigorous tender process against systems from 10 other US, European and Chinese companies so to come out on top is a boost, not just for our Synbiosis Division, but also for other life science firms in Cambridge's innovation hub."

Scientific Digital Imaging on Friday said it sold 25 of its ProtoCOL 3 technology to the Chinese State Food and Drug Administration. ProtoCOL 3 is colony counter, an instrument used to count colonies of bacteria and other microorganisms. The government organisation paid $120,000 for the products to aid in vaccine and antibiotic testing at regional laboratories across China. It is the largest order of colony counters this year which came via the company's distributor Hua Yue Enterprise Holdings. The firm sold 27 in Asia last year. "Selling the ProtoCOL 3 systems to the Chinese equivalent of the [Food and Drug Administration] is a coup," Chairman of Scientific Digital Imaging, Ken Ford, said.

He concluded that cash generation at current spot prices remains constrained: "It is against this backdrop that Aquarius will continue to focus on operational improvements and cash preservation whilst remaining committed to improving the quality of life of the communities surrounding its operations."