To be honest, there’s not much point picking the bones out of troubled mid-market software and managed services player, Maxima’s half-time results.
Since buy/build/turnaround/dispose entrepreneur Ian Smith took over the reins as executive chairman at the end of last year, he has embarked on a vigorous ‘excess weight reduction’ regime (see Maxima minimises!), with three disposals to date, including yesterday’s announcement of the sale of Maxima’s Document Management Services, Intellect and Microsoft sub-divisions, to m-hance Group, part of Jon Mouton’s Better Capital stable (see Mid market debutante: m-hance). This deal raised another £6.5m cash on the nose, with a further £300k due in 27 months.
But for the record, Maxima’s revenues (pre-disposals) for the six months to 30th Nov. 2011 declined by 9% to £21.5m, and the business recorded an operating loss of £325k and a net loss of £568k. Post-disposals, net debt has better than halved to £4.2m.
This is clearly not the end of the affair, with Smith noting the high level of interest from private equity firms in managed services businesses with recurring revenue streams – just like ... oh what the heck, you can fill in the blanks yourselves!