From todays Telegraph business pages, also on thier website,
Airport operator calls for cash refuel
The future of PlaneStation, the owner of Manston Airport in Kent and EUjet, came into question yesterday when the company admitted it did not have enough cash to keep operating and needed to raise at least £17m from investors.
Shares in the company halved to 20½p - they have been as high as 600p - as investors baulked at the bad news included in the company's interim results statement.
The company's pre-tax loss grew from £5.4m to £8.6m, revenue fell from £4.5m to £4.4m and the amount of cargo passing through the airport fell 33pc.
PlaneStation also revealed it spent £2.1m supporting EUjet, a new Irish airline run by PJ McGoldrick, the former chief executive of Ryanair. Plane‐Station owns 30pc and plans to buy the other 70pc in the next few months for €1 (69p).
Martin May, chief executive, announced plans to raise £17m through a sale of shares to institutions, and if there is demand, £5m through a sale to retail investors. An offer document is scheduled to be published in two weeks, and an extraordinary general meeting is set for three weeks later to authorise the capital raising and purchase of EUjet.
"If we can't raise the money we will have to do asset sales, and that would potentially destroy shareholder value," Mr May said. "That reaction [in the share price] is really because people don't understand the dynamics of this business."
PlaneStation, formerly Wiggins Group, aims to build up EUjet and fly 880,000 passengers from Kent next year.
Mr May said he had cut the annual cash costs from £7.4m to £4m, and a bank loan due on December 31 had been extended by three years.
Shareholders hit by yesterday's fall included Prudential, Artimus, Legal & General and Schroders.
Mr May was this week named turnaround professional of the year for his work at scaffolder Cape, which he took from a share price below 10p to above 100p.
PlaneStation
draw your own views over this i guess, but it looks like planestations future rides on eujet to me.
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