NCC Group raises €57 million

NCC Group plc (“NCC Group” or “the Group”), a leading Manchester-based independent provider of IT assurance, security and consultancy services, has raised over £38 million in total for the Group and selling shareholders via an institutional placing. The market capitalisation of the Group on admission to AIM will be over £55 million.  

Placing details:

• Placing price of 170p per ordinary share.
• The Group has raised £21.4 million to reduce Group debt substantially.
• The Group placed 9.9 million ordinary shares for the selling shareholders, including Barclays Private Equity, which has retained a holding of 9.7%.
• Directors and employees hold approximately 21% of the issued share capital of the Group on admission. None of the directors or employees sold any shares in the placing.
• Conditional dealings will commence today at 8.00 a.m. with unconditional dealings expected to start on AIM on 14 July 2004 (Ticker symbol NCC.L).
• Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein is the nominated adviser, broker and underwriter and with Rickitt Mitchell & Partners is joint financial adviser.

Rob Cotton, NCC Group Chief Executive, said: “The widespread institutional support for the placing is very encouraging and confirms our track record and growth prospects. The float enables us to raise significantly the profile of escrow and helps us promote the value of our IT assurance services.

“As we stated when we launched our fund raising programme, the current financial year has started well. Already over £5.5 million of revenue from our escrow solutions division is secured, in addition to aggregate order books standing in excess of £2 million in the other divisions. We are confident that we will deliver another year of good growth.”