Fortunately the ancient past and both the dysfunctional and recovery periods are behind us and to steal a line from one of the past characters Jack Perkowski we are Building a Billion Dollar International Business.
Ancient Past:
*Current Non Exec Director Blair Sergent was Executive Director business development when Vmoto was acquired in May 2006 (SP $1.20.).
* Vmoto was an Australian company that distributed Vespa look alike ICE bikes in Vietnam and Iran amongst other things. The bikes were manufactured in China by Feedomoter a company associated with Charles Chen. Blair was later Appointed MD. Performance bonuses were part of the landscape during this period.
* In Dec 2006 (SP 80c) Feedomoter was acquired and Charles Chen was appointed Executive Director.
* In May 2007 (SP $1.20) one of the founders of the company Patrick Daven replaced Blair Sargent as MD and an Independent Chairman Verios was appointed.
* Sept 2009 (SP $0.80) Verios and Sergent resigned to concentrate on other endeavours.
* Dec 2009 share Price hits high point of $1.90.
The Dysfunctional Period:
*Starting with the board removing Russel Goodman a substantial shareholder from the Chairmans position on the 17/1/10 two months later Goodman calls for an EGM to have Beesley removed as a director. On the same day Daven calls for an EGM to have Goodman removed as a director. The share price starts its fall off the cliff.
*February 11 a truce emerges when Goodman agrees to resign and the board agrees to appoint his nominees Ms Alicia Atkinson as COO and Chinese resident Jack Perkowski as a Director. Jack is a Chinese Resident entrepreneur whose claim to fame is 18 years on wall St which culminates in being appointed Head of Investment Banking at brokerage firm Paine Webber. He wasn't shy when it came to self promotion and wrote a book. Managing the Dragon " How I'm building a billion dollar business in china". He didn't fit well and resigned 3 months later in May 2011.
*The saga continued with two unsuccessful attempts by Goldman in Sept 2011 to have all directors removed and himself and a chaps called Fitt and Rahi installed.
* But the damage was done VMT was on the nose with shareholders and customers alike and the share price had dropped to 20 cents
* Daven Resigned and Charles Chen was thrown in at the deep end and appointed MD.
Recovery Period:
* During this recovery period the business concentrated on building a business around International B2B and B2C in china . The share price fell to a low of 4.5c when sales in china tanked due to CCP initiatives and after 6 years with a lot of lessons learnt a decision was made to exit the B2C loss making business in China and concentrate on High margin international sales. Recovery started to emerge. It took another two years of proving up the new plan for the share price to get back to 20 Cents
Period operating under current Business Plan.
During this period an opportunity to form an alliance with Super Soco emerged. This resulted in VMT securing the right to distribute the Super Soco products Internationally for virtually zero cost. This was the catalyst for building an International distribution, support and servicing network.
Phill Campbell a business reconstruction consultant was appointed Non Executive Chairman, key staff retention payments and performance bonuses were reintroduced, sales grew strongly, along with a pattern of profits doubling on an annual basis.
The share price had recovered to 20c by Nov 2019 and the last three years have seen the returns from investing in equities stagnate due to the head winds we are well aware of.
Because of VMT's ability to Double profits on an annual basis during this period it has been able to double the share price when its main competitors have been decimated or struggled to survive and markets in general have been flat as a pancake.
Bon Appetite.
VMT Price at posting:
40.5¢ Sentiment: None Disclosure: Held
(20min delay)