I think SPZ could be ripe for takeover for the following reasons:
- Software and developed technology fully matured in its product cycle (page 18 of the half year report ending 31 Dec showing these almost minimal book value remaining).
- Run rate of 10+ sites a month and aiming at a total of 300 sites with increased margin is hard to ignore.
- As previously discussed bar no further disasters from here this company is firming up its sustainable profitability going into FY19.
- Company has no debt (which private equity likes to then take over and then expand through gearing).
I agree with you 6186 that it's now largely up to Morris and his crew. Does he still have another 2 - 3 years to invest into the business to maximise its full potential and turn it into a truly global player with scale (US, UK, Asia, AUS)? Or after 5+ years of ups and downs he's happy to just call it a day if someone else comes along and offer 30% premium to a declining 30-day VWAP? Does he still back Gillespie to continue run this company after his most recent management oversight of the UK issue? Or happy to just let it run its course as a perpetual side project?
Towards today's close there was ~1m shares on offer at 19c. So someone is betting that Morris is either not willing or not able to top up on market, even though as we all know he has much more than sufficient financial capacity as a rich lister to take the whole company private let alone fund the transaction.
Meanwhile someone could either be working the share price down and accumulating to either (1) anticipate or engineer an opportunistic takeover bid (2) going long and seeing it back to 40c - 50c level assuming growth path is indeed intact (3) Morris going all in and making a bid to take it private after a lack of return from multi-year investment as a public company. The bot wouldn't be working so damn hard IMO if there isn't such opportunity to make a buck at this price level.
See recent car parking M&A on page 3:
https://www.baillieuholst.com.au/publishedresearch/2018/spz_06apr18.pdf
(20min delay)