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Pokerchips - I think you are way off in your estimation of expected initial churn (not really a genuine churn it's a special case - the annualised loss is unknown).

First thing that is obvious was that the initial transfer was the most dangerous time wrt losing clients as the issue of if the actually wanted the service was brought to the forefront of their consideration, so 13% was IMO very low and I was surprised it wasn't higher - the big test is how many of them stick around for the first year.

Remember the transfer of MeetingZone clients was a disaster with service failures for new and existing clients - it looks like they may have learned their lesson and got this right.

Anyway more pertinent than all the above is the value of the client base that transferred, and I think it is way above the conservative estimate the company made of £10m/annum revenue, nearer £30m and possibly more.

I think the market has got it wrong, as the company are massively underplaying this, probably because they know if they overestimate the company will be punished ruthlessly.

On 7th Sept the company RNSed the clients represented a revenue stream of circa $35m so assuming 13% loss of business that leaves £30.45m /annum (nothing wrong with that Pokerchips)

"On Friday 2 September, PGi Connect sent out the first and largest batch of contract assignment notices to c.8,100 of its enterprise customers concerning the transition of services to LoopUp from 1 October 2022. These customers currently generate an annualised revenue run-rate of c.£34 million to PGi Connect."

Also note that is not all the clients , so we can assume there is more value to be added if some of the other clients transfer.

Even better is the new potential to X-sell Cloud services - that will come with time and as a good proportion of Cloud customers come from existing clients already the significant opportunity is obvious.

I think the market is being very harsh on Loopup - but it's understandable due to the history of out management underachieving.

To be honest I thought the RNS was good, but IMO has been greeted badly because yet again it introduces uncertainty about earnings.

As I recall they did exactly the same last year, if I didn't know better I'd suspect there are happy with a low SP as it gives them more and more leverage over shareholders

Anyway, I think the dip is overdone as the revenue looks like easily beating forecasts and costs are obviously going to be higher than anticipated when supporting more clients during growth - and there are more clients to transfer yet.

The cloud offering should be virtually self-supporting by now- Steve said he expect it at around 50 clients- compounding is starting to kick in now.

In response to the comment about " not a fantastic product" , the product is MS teams which is the worlds most popular, they are providing added value services and the RNS says they have retained all clients and signed additional contracts - if the business critical service was no good they would be losing lots of clients.

What does anyone expect from a management team that has shown itself to be greedy and self-serving time and time again - the thread title suggests they are crooks - a strong throwaway statement - I've seen nothing to show they are crooks, incompetent and greedy yes.
Issuing large quantities of shares to themselves (done via a committee, but it's still them) is unethical after all they are responsible for trashing the SP and benefitting from it without even setting a hurdle to reach is incentivising failure.

WRT to having 2 CEOs , it is an absolute disgrace, I argued long ago that at least one of them should be sacked - but make no mistake, they must have the support of the big shareholders who will want a return on their capital.

So, it changes nothing for me, I still think there is very significant potential for a turnaround for Loopup and we are at or near rock bottom.

White - I think that's a little too much in one step - start by being open to the possibility of them pulling success from the jaws of disaster and work up from there. lol

Just heard on the Radio that Whatsapp has gone down around the world - millions of users denied service. I don't know if that helps or hurts Loopup. Would be better if Zoom went down so their wings get clipped, if nothing else it will perhaps highlight the importance of reliable/ secure comms.

White - I'm not that optimistic (just a little after recent news), I don't like the CEO's one little bit, however I'm just keeping a balanced viewpoint because recent news flow has provided some real positive impetus.

How a potentially large (very large) chunk of revenue and profit can be seen as an anything other than an outstanding development is beyond me. The market ignoring it, does not mean it wasn't good.
Yes, they have the well documented problems the most important of which is the rate of conversion of cloud customers - it's still far too slow in generating meaningful revenues - if they pick the pace up all other problems fade away. If/when they get to grips with it this investment takes on an entirely new completion - the SP can soar due to the nature of these type of services once the overhead is covered it becomes very profitable.

Of course, it's easy to talk it up, but the at least they now have a chance to turn this around, it's all down to our management team to deliver. Maybe we'll never see our original stake back, but we may get a good uplift from here.

So, I'm happy hold for now.

Guys didn't realise you had just been discussing around the points a just made - otherwise I would have credited your points. So pleased the broader situation is being recognised - well played.

I don't think there is a direct correlation but it there are a lot fewer posts then trades it invariably mean a poor day; I think it's a case of excitement at a rising price, even if it's a fraction of a penny brings out all the bullish, the sad thing is that they lose confidence equally quickly. Arthur has alluded to the lack of stability caused by easily swayed PI's as part of the problem with the SP.

Anyway, just an observation, the purpose of this post is to comment Arthur's disclosure that COPL have been approached by a large US operator about partnering up.

Firstly, if something come of it then presumably, they will provide some sort of carry on development costs and perhaps take over as operator, if not they will have to provide a very large payment to COPL or a mix of the two. The size of any settlement is likely to be very significant to COPL and slash of remove the current finance problems - Will they even need a loan.

I was surprised he mentioned it and rushed to get the information out to shareholders when he was running out of time. Can we conclude perhaps he wanted to news out as an invitation to other potential partners (you can't beat a competitive bidding process). It also raises the spectre that COPL are holding up a deal on bank finance as they will get much more favourable terms if cashed up.

He also put a timescale on it by saying the drilling is scheduled for January and using the pipes of the potential partner - to do that surely a deal must have been well advanced, or it could not possibly be concluded with proper due diligence.

So, my question, are we going to game changing news for Christmas?

Interesting general viewpoint from Gartner (Loopup quote their growth projections regularly) that IT spend including comms will not stop or slow materially if there is a recession - which is surely very good news for :Loopup.

In fact, they go further with their analyst apparently suggested the movement away from some services to new technology to drive efficiency and costs - Loopup shareholders don't need to be told about that as they suffered with the fall of the company's legacy business and now all rests of the Cloud Comms initiative coming good.

“Economic turbulence will change the context for technology investments, increasing spending in some areas and accelerating declines in others, but it is not projected to materially impact the overall level of enterprise technology spending.”

IMO the nature of the problems caused by a recession could very easily cause some companies, especially international companies to accelerate their plans to migrate the Cloud based Comms, whereas smaller operators are perhaps more likely slow or stop initiative.

At least we are not yet "doomed", "all doomed" and they can carry on progressing the company's plans.

White - I suspect you have a different take on it.

https://www.cityam.com/it-industry-is-recession-proof-as-businesses-look-to-cut-costs/

It's always good to have a significant shareholder increase - but is that just part of the recent capital raise? Others should also be releasing holdings RNS's I would have thought.

Strangely, for me one of the real positives with the capital raise was that it was shunned by PI's - who probably bought in the previous offer hoping to turn a quick profit and where well and truly burned - and contributed to the SP collapse.

PI's (the active ones) have practically deserted this share which means we get very few trades, and no one just acquired a large quantity of shares with the intent of trading/dumping them if the price goes up slightly which I'm sure happened last time.

Institutions generally stick to their shares longer and sell based on better logic and understanding than the majority of PI's.

Thorden - That's a fair stance if you feel it's too risky at the moment

I'm not buying any at the moment either because I have lost money and I don't chase losses.

WhiteKnight14 - if I hadn't any hope that this could come good, I would sell up, as I said above, I don't chase losses.

Your stance is very strange "ever the pessimist" why not sell if you are adamant the company is finish, as your logic suggests that if you truly are a shareholder with that view you expect to lose all your money. You are simply trolling the BB, criticising even good news and ever positive comment. Of course, I have credited you with being a shareholder, but your posts more likely suggest a disgruntled ex-employee, troll or perhaps pursuing some short agenda.

Hopefully today will represent a change point in the company's fortunes as the AGM will approve the capital raise and mark a reset - with all sections of the business enjoying what should be very significant growth over the next year and the cash available to support it.

As long as they put in a solid performance this should mark the low point for the company, I'm not talking about the SP of course, that doesn't necessarily follow performance in the short term as we all know only too well.

IMO a good day if resolutions passed even if the SP moves the wrong way for our liking - its progress.

Lamp - besides the company advising the market that rollout and take up of services would be slower than anticipated, it's worth mentioning that they never have said that ultimate sales volumes will be reduced. They started producing Low (minimum contracted), Medium and High sales potential figures - sooner or later clients will start moving through the stages or not after the initial implementation - if not the company will almost certainly go out of business in a couple of years.

Now for the first time since the early days of service rollout they are daring to hint in some detail at the scale of some of their clients and potential client win. To do so gives an indication that they expect to see some success with the clients (I believe from the RNS's early on it is possible to deduce that at least one big potential contract was lost or at least delayed as the revenues never materialised - so they are cautious. It bothered me at the time but perhaps they did win it but on an initially small scale.

The outfits they described in the interims are likely all multi-billion turnover enterprises, whereas the sign up so far clearly IMO includes a majority which are well below the average potential run rate of £100k/annum that could be deduced with an average contract of 3 years. Currently the average turnover/client is about £20k/annum (£1.2m/60 clients) - so they were perhaps overegging it early on. Highlighting one with a revenue generation of £260/annum minimum and further rollout growth to come - so one company highlighted generated 13 times the average.

Therefore, it would suggest that the bigger companies are far more meaningful than signing up dozens of small fry - hence perhaps their focus on listing the bigger companies. Number of clients is in fact a little meaningless.

Perhaps we can also deduce that some have signed up for additional commitments as they claim 130 contracts and only 60 clients - some must be moving into the second identified rollout phase which is apparently 3 times the value of the first.

So generically hinting at the big clients and potential clients is IMO a significant guide of greater traction with larger companies and expected client base to come.

White - ever the optimist.

" Yes you’d expect some cash thrown off but that’s not going to happen."

Yes I do expect some significant cash to be throw off with a new client base of what looks like it could be anything up to £50/annum book nominal value (£38m so far) which they are conservatively estimating to only retain £10m for this year, so lots of scope to outperform and potential ramp up even in a shrinking market - the cash generation is expected to be very significant at £5m.

On the cloud side the company (CEO presentation) advised that at around 60 clients they expected the offering to be self-supporting - so no cash required and as the rollout ramps up. I would expect cash to be generated - of course it will at the high margins the service delivers - it's all about gaining critical mass. Don't worry yourself.

Thorndon - I hope it's a recovery play, if not it isn't investable, as you seem to suggest.

On the basis it is a recovery play, I support your second observation that the key factor "WHEN".

By "a long time off" I assume you mean years, IMO it can't be a long way off, the market for the services will not stand still and wait and neither will the patience of key investors.

They should have been growing and throwing off cash this year and pushed it back because of slow rollout and decision making from potential customers - they got is wrong. If that is true and it sounds perfectly realistic to me for our bundling CEO's - then the principle on which success is based still stands and the turning points is only pushed back.

The growth was tied to assumptions that rollout would start to compound as new and existing clients expanded at the same time - that still stands, and the growth should accelerate - not just reliant upon new business. Take for example the PR company they highlight in the interims which is surely our biggest client for Cloud services, they appear pretty well matured yet have another 18 countries to rollout. Clearly the based case contracted sales are not sufficient even for the company's survival and growth of existing client sales it has to happen, or the company is not a recovery play - it's dead in the water.

I think it is also likely that growth in clients will either fade out or explode- the service is either desirable or just an also-ran and that is not decided yet - that's why it is reassuring to see interest from presumably savvy larger enterprises.

Of course, anything is possible, But I'm not expecting a BMO or the much more likely option a delisting.

A delisting means shareholders rush to sell their shares and thy can pick them up cheap without having to offer a premium.

I don't think either outcome is likely as it requires the team having the confidence and finance (they are prepared to lock in for years) and crucially the support of a majority of shareholders and in light of what they have done in favouring a cornerstone shareholder and directors to maintain a blocking share I reckon it would need to be a super majority of 75%.

Only easy if you can rely on most institutions - so it's IMO too risky for them, especially as Loopup is the gift that keeps on giving for the CEO's - a listing could see them make a sizeable killing on their shares if they manage a recover, a delist will likely mean they will never reap the rewards again. Why would they jump off the gravy train.

Most likely outcomes are they eventually turn it around to at least modest success and if they can't turn it around it is a takeover or liquidation

The recent updates include an insight into some of the client companies, it's very revealing IMO as one company appears to account for approximately 20% of cloud revenues, so some others are logically quite small. There is a hint in this pattern that some of these companies could eventually become very significant - I was concerned that we were not winning any larger companies (even if they roll-out cautiously).

I also recall that the company touted the massive potential for other services that could be integrated into the platform were growing even faster, cross-selling opportunities for Hybridium, partner agreements (one should be rolling out NOW and a new Cisco offering this year. All that promise they should now be or start delivering - I still have concerns WRT failings in these, clear opportunities and now apparently side-lined areas. Unless they are quietly progressing them!

What was most interesting in the update was the comments that wins include major global companies across a broad range of sectors, and most notably:

"a leading global communications consulting firm with c.7,000 employees across 30 countries"
and
"wins include a US-headquartered Fortune 100 technology company"

Those are the only two that give some hint to potential opportunity size, what stood out for me was the Fortune 100 company, if it truly is a technology company in the Fortune 100 then it is a very big enterprise, for instance the lowest ranking is Thermo Fisher Scientific with 130,000 employees and a $31bn turnover, as you move up the companies are monsters like IBM, Cisco and Intel. Surely, they must be talking of a subsidiary company or simpl]y one of the top 100 US technology specific companies in some lesser index - otherwise it is a massive scalp.

They also have Proof of concept and request for proposals progressing with "top-5 global law firm, a Big-4 accounting firm, a major global sportswear company, and a leading holidays group". Some of these are by definition Multi £billion turnover companies, I suspect in most cases it is with subsidiary outfits, otherwise it equates to 10s of thousands of users.

The current revenue this year and financial outcome was disappointing to say the least - but looking forward it's understandable that institutions are prepared to continue to fund this, even if PI's are all but out of the game.

WRT the SP there is nothing to be done until the dust settles and the action is approved, then I expect the SP to recover steadily.

Companies don't hold a session like that to deliver bad news, I can't recall one. I wouldn't be surprised if it is accompanied by a statement on the reserve-based loan or operational performance Monday or Tuesday morning. If not, it could become outdated very quickly by events.

No one is going to be pleased with the performance, but that performance was priced in IMO- it's the step change which is expected going forward that now matters - they need to deliver and there really is no more leeway to contour up yet another pathetic "this time next year Rodney" excuses. This seems to have gone on for multiple runs just like the wonderful Fools and Horses series but without laughs.

WRT the capital raise, I think in all it was not only necessary to permit programme execution but could turn out to have been a smart move as economic woes grip the markets as raising money could prove very tricky for some - any company that does not resolve its problems in good time may be punish mercilessly (ref- credit crunch).

Peaky - you'll be sadly missed, I'm sure maybe by someone, hope you do well elsewhere and bring cheer to others.

lamp - yes you're right the statement could have been structured better and ultimately every penny raised helps pay back outstanding debt in the long run - but the money raised is for investment not simply to cover a debt position.

The company debt is now relatively low/manageable and once they start making decent profits again, I would expect them to go for a new long-term package - hopefully when rates start to settle down. Debt is likely to be a problem for many companies in the short term in the UK thanks to loopy liz. It's either dopy, loopy or loony I'm not quite sure yet, depends how far she digs in.