Final Results

Online Travel Corporation PLC 16 December 2003 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 16th December 2003 ONLINE TRAVEL CORPORATION PLC PRELIMINARY RESULTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31ST OCTOBER 2003 The board of Online Travel Corporation plc ('OTC' or the 'Company') is pleased to present the Company's unaudited preliminary results for the year ended 31 October 2003. Results • 23% growth in gross sales to £104.9million • 40% growth in leisure division sales to £71.4 million • EBITDA of £1.0 million (before exceptional items and web development costs) • Adaption of OTC systems for third party travel sector • Adaption of OTC systems for demographic targeting • New contract wins in business travel division worth £6 million Outlook • Post year end sales growth of 300% + in flagship brand, OnlineTravel.com • New exclusive strategic travel partnership with Freeserve.com • Launch of ThomasCook.com • Integration of no frills carriers into Travelstore.com's self-book system • Benefits of the implementation of £3.0 million cost reduction programme £8.3 million fundraising to strengthen balance sheet and invest in growth Chairman of OTC, Tomasso Zanzotto, commented: 'In an extremely challenging year for the travel industry, the Company has strengthened its foundations and managed to expand its business. 'Current trading indications are very encouraging. Our flagship brand, OnlineTravel.com, has achieved gross sales growth of more than 300 per cent over the last six weeks. Whilst the Company's sales growth to-date has primarily been generated from 'white label' partnerships, this growth in our flagship brand and the recent launch of ThomasCook.com are significant milestones in our development. Growth across our three sales channels: strategic partnerships; travel licensing; and own brands; highlights OTC's ability to derive revenue streams from a number of sources using one core technical platform. 'The £8.3 million placing also announced today, provides the Group with the financial strength required to fulfil its ambitious growth plans and meet its regulatory capital requirements. The Board views the year ahead with optimism.' For further information, please contact: Online Travel Corporation plc Mark Jones, Chief Executive Tel: + 44 (0) 20 8607 9281 Mark Simpkins, Finance Director Tel: + 44 (0) 20 8408 6742 CardewChancery Richard Fallowfield Tel: + 44 (0) 20 7930 0777 Jeanette Hamster Tel: + 44 (0) 20 7930 0777 Chairman's Statement 2003 was a challenging year for the entire travel sector. I am therefore pleased to report that the Group has achieved continued sales growth, further progress in the development of its corporate objectives and has enhanced its future prospects. In addition to increasing overall sales during the year, we continued to focus on developing our sales channels, adding to the content of our sites, and achieving operating efficiencies. The Group is already experiencing the benefits of the system enhancements implemented during the year and I am encouraged that the quality of our products is being recognised by an increasing number of blue chip clients. The Group's strategy is to create a major content driven travel business able to leverage its technological expertise to derive revenues from three channels - our own brands, those of our 'white-label' partners and licenced sites - and I am encouraged by developments across all channels. Results The value of the Group's transactional revenue grew to £104.9 million, an increase of 23 per cent over last year. The main driver of this growth was a 40 per cent increase in leisure travel sales to £71.4 million, in turn driven primarily by increasing volumes of dynamically packaged deals via our pioneering Build-Your-Own (BYO) technology. The corporate and concession travel markets remained difficult throughout the period, however, recent contract wins are evidence of the quality of our offering in this area and provide encouragement for the future of these businesses. Statutory Group turnover increased to £86.5 million (2002: £70.2 million) and statutory gross profit (before exceptional costs) increased to £11.8 million (2002: £9.8 million). Despite pressure from travel industry suppliers to lower commissions and change charging mechanisms, the gross margin percentage on statutory turnover held up well at 13.6 per cent (2002: 13.9 per cent), driven predominantly by increased higher margin BYO sales and the successful implementation of booking fees. EBITDA (before web development and exceptional costs) was £1.0 million (2002: £2.0 million). Web development costs, which we continue to charge as they are incurred, increased to £2.4 million (2002: £1.6 million) reflecting the increased range and integration of travel products and content on our own and client sites. This figure includes approximately £0.4 million in relation to the integration of Travelstore.com and Allhotels.com, acquired in 2002 and approximately £0.3 million in relation to the development of our booking systems to enable their use by third party travel companies. Despite charging all the development costs associated with the establishment of the ThomasCook.com site in the year under review, the Board have taken the view that the licence revenues should be deferred to the current year. Exceptional costs of £2.0 million (2002: £1.0 million) consist of £1.2 million from the non-recovery of amounts due, including those from acquisitions made last year and £0.8 million in respect of termination payments, re-organisation costs and a write off relating to discontinued business streams. An operating cost reduction programme was implemented towards the end of the year, the full benefit of which is expected to be felt in the current year and beyond. Annualised savings of approximately £3.0 million were identified from cost reductions at Travelstore and All Hotels and from increased automation. The net loss for the year, after a taxation credit for research and development of £0.7 million (2002: £0.5 million) is £5.2 million (2002: £2.6 million), resulting in a loss per share of 4.4p (2002: loss per share of 2.7p). Balance Sheet / Funding Group cash balances at 31 October 2003 were £2.5 million (2002: £4.1 million), however, the Group's balance sheet, showing net current liabilities of £2.8 million (including a bank loan of £0.5 million) (2002: net current assets of £0.9 million), is not sufficiently robust for the Travel Regulatory Bodies to renew the Group's operating licences. In order to renew its annual Air Travel Operators License, the Company requires sufficient balance sheet strength to meet the minimum net free asset requirements of the Civil Aviation Authority. For this reason, the Board have today announced a placing of new shares to raise £8.3 million for the Company. The Board believe that these funds are adequate for the Company to obtain all necessary licences to continue to operate in its principal markets and to finance its anticipated growth. Current trading and prospects Further to the announcement on 6 October 2003 of a contract to provide a new UK e-commerce platform for Thomas Cook, one of the worlds leading travel groups, ThomasCook.com was launched on 25 November 2003. Flights, hotels and BYO holidays are currently available on the site with further booking services, including car hire and insurance, following in the new year. We expect this site to be a significant source of new revenue for the Group. Following the launch of an enhanced flight booking system and the introduction of new search engine optimisation technology onto OTC's flagship brand, OnlineTravel.com in October 2003, the site's sales volumes have increased. In the period since the year end, sales through OnlineTravel.com increased by over 300 per cent compared to the same period last year and were achieved with only a modest increase in marketing spend. Overall, leisure division sales are up by in excess of 40 per cent, year on year, since the year end. This is all organic growth and excludes sales via ThomasCook.com. Travelstore.com, the Group's business travel site, has recently completed the first phase of the integration into its flight booking engine of a number of the leading 'no-frills' carriers. Such integration will continue into the New Year. This seeks to enable OTC to provide Travelstore.com clients with a more complete range of flight options. OTC has also recently agreed an enhanced, exclusive contract with the UK's number one internet services provider, Freeserve. Our new strategic relationship with Freeserve and other third parties further endorses the Company's strategy of low cost customer acquisition in partnership with major portals and retailers and demonstrates the quality of our services and products. Current trading indications are very encouraging. Whilst the Company's sales growth to-date has primarily been generated from 'white label' partnerships, the growth in our flagship brand and the recent launch of ThomasCook.com are significant milestones in our development. Growth across our three sales channels: strategic partnerships; travel licensing; and own brands, highlight OTC's ability to derive revenue streams from a number of sources using one core technical platform. We do not underestimate the challenges of a rapidly changing travel industry, but our dedicated and enthusiastic management and employees continue to focus on increasing sales and producing further cost efficiencies. This coupled with the actions taken to strengthen the Group's balance sheet puts us in a strong position to benefit from the continued predicted growth in online travel in Europe. We look forward to building further on the sound platform we have established in 2003 and growing revenues from all three of our income streams. Tommaso Zanzotto Chairman 16th December 2003 CHIEF EXECUTIVE'S REVIEW Operational Review OTC operates travel sites for a wide range of portals, media groups, retailers and other travel businesses. Enhancements to our systems undertaken during the year have already resulted in significant new sites such as ThomasCook.com being added to our existing list which includes Freeserve, The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, Financial Times, Priceline, Cheapflights.com, Virgin, and Tiscali in the UK and Zuji, AOL and Alta Vista in the Asia Pacific region. Our technological ability to provide targeted services to different demographic groups of consumers highlights the flexibility of our system and has allowed us to launch our own Youthtravel.com site and several other sites for major youth and student groups including student.uk.com and the Ministry of Sound. This ability has been recognised by many other consumer groups and we are in discussions with a number of them to provide similar services. We continue to offer our customers the choice of booking online or via our call centres, but our focus remains on driving more business online, where the cost of processing is a fraction of the cost of a call centre booking. Overall growth in gross sales during the year of over 23% to £104.9 million was pleasing, in light of the increased threat of terrorism, the war in Iraq and the impact of SARS. Own Brand Strategy The OTC business model enables large portals, media groups and retailers to provide e-travel services tailored to the needs of their customers and the recently launched OnlineTravel.com brand, provides the Group with visibility on client sites. As the number of major media and retail clients grows, so does the awareness and value of our OnlineTravel.com brand. Other own brands include specialist sites such as 1ski.com, Ifyouski.com, Ifyougolf.com, Ifyoudive.com and various activity, youth and explorer sites. These brands have a growing database of direct customers and we are continually adding to the quality of the content and products on offer. Whilst we plan to use our multiple brand strategy to exploit the unique virtues of online marketing to achieve growth, our marketing strategy in 2004 will be focused on building on the initial success of OnlineTravel.com, our flagship brand. Technology Licensing OTC has adapted its proprietary technology to enable it to derive additional licensing revenues. Real opportunities exist in the travel market for licensing selected technology and the quality of our products for both the business and the leisure travel sectors places us in a strong position to capitalise on direct and third-party licensing agreements. In the corporate travel market 'Envoy', an Internet based business travel management system, enables large corporate groups or travel agencies to manage their business travel requirements. During the year, two new clients were secured and we anticipate that the inclusion of no-frills carriers and hotels in the first quarter of 2004 will allow us to convert more potential sales. In the leisure travel market, 'Travel Junction', a product consisting of selected components of our leisure booking systems, formed the basis of the most significant contract of the year, ThomasCook.com. The announcement of our new contract with Thomas Cook during the year and the subsequent launch of the site on 25 November 2003 is a significant milestone in our development. We are encouraged by the interest that this has generated and are in discussions with several large travel companies that are attracted by the end-to-end e-commerce systems we can provide. We believe few other European based travel businesses can offer the same range of end-to-end e-commerce services. Divisional Review Leisure The leisure travel division experienced the highest growth during the period, with a 40 per cent increase in gross sales to £71.4 million (2002: £51.0 million). This increase in sales highlights the increasing trend amongst consumers towards planning and booking their travel online and the enhancements undertaken to our product range, particularly to include BYO capability. 2003 was also a good year for our own brands, particularly OnlineTravel.com and our winter sports site Ifyouski.com which experienced increased levels of transactions. This trend has continued since the year end, most notably with the spectacular growth in sales at OnlineTravel.com. OTC has also recently agreed an enhanced contract with the UK's number one internet services provider, Freeserve. As part of this new contract, OTC will offer users on the Freeserve travel channel exclusive access to key travel components including flights and dynamic packaging sections. OTC will also offer ferries, Eurostar, villa and short-break services. Corporate Corporate travel business sales were impacted not only by the war in Iraq and SARS, but also by economic pressures on corporate travel budgets, a general reduction in the average transactional values of scheduled air tickets, a migration of business travellers to low cost carriers (which were not available on the Travelstore.com booking engine during the year) and by direct booking. Gross sales contribution from the division of £25.1 million represented a marginal increase on the £24.3 million reported in 2002. On a like for like basis, however, taking into account the Travelstore business which was acquired in the third quarter of 2002, gross sales reduced by 26 per cent. Whilst we expect conditions in the business travel sector to continue to be challenging, we are encouraged by a number of new contracts won towards the end of the year - Chivas Brothers, Ekonsol and InterPublic Group - which in aggregate are expected to generate in excess of £6 million of gross sales in the current year. In addition, Travelstore.com has recently completed the first integration of a 'no-frills' carrier into its flight booking system. This allows Travelstore.com to offer a no frills carrier solution and therefore a more complete range of flight options to customers via its corporate self-book system. Further such carriers are expected to be integrated into the Travelstore.com systems shortly. Travelstore.com's internet travel management system is recognised as one of the most advanced in the European market and ownership of this platform stands the Group in good stead to benefit from expected increases in online corporate self-booking. Trade concessions The difficult trading conditions in the travel industry led to redundancies in the sector making this a challenging period for our trade concession business. The gross sales of £8.4 million were 17 per cent below those achieved in 2002. We have reduced costs within the division and continue to focus on building on the 30 per cent of concession transactions that are transacted online. Financial Review The following pro-forma profit and loss account for the Group includes the sales and associated costs of joint ventures and associates and the direct costs of Travelstore.com Limited and Allhotel.com Limited acquired last year. Year ended 31 October --------- --------- 2003 2002 £m £m Leisure travel and media 71.4 51.0 Business travel 25.1 24.3 Concession travel 8.4 10.2 --------- --------- Gross Sales Value 104.9 85.5 --------- --------- --------- --------- Gross Profit 13.3 11.5 --------- --------- 12.7% 13.4% Operating Costs Sales and Marketing costs (2.2) (1.8) Reservations & call centre costs (4.2) (3.7) Central overheads (3.4) (2.8) All Hotels (1.0) (0.3) Travelstore (1.5) (1.0) --------- --------- (12.3) (9.5) --------- --------- EBITDA Pre-Web (pre-exceptionals) 1.0 2.0 Web Development (2.4) (1.6) --------- --------- EBITDA Post-Web (1.4) 0.4 Depreciation/Amortisation (1.8) (1.7) Finance and bonding (0.8) (0.7) Exceptionals (2.0) (1.0) R&D tax credit 0.7 0.5 --------- --------- (3.9) (3.0) --------- --------- ========= ========= Loss (5.2) (2.6) ========= ========= The increase in overhead is heavily influenced by the £1.0 million attributable to All Hotels, acquired in the fourth quarter of 2002 and the £1.5 million attributable to Travelstore, acquired in the third quarter of 2002. Travelstore has been fully integrated with Joint Venture Travel and All Hotels is now operated from London, which has resulted in the closure of its Edinburgh office, with the exception of a small team of developers. Costs for both businesses are expected to be significantly reduced in the current year. In the case of All Hotels, directly attributable costs in 2004 are projected to be less than £0.5 million. Excluding the acquisitions of All Hotels and Travelstore, operating costs increased by 19% to £9.8 million (2002: £8.2 million), in line with management expectations. Interest and bonding costs increased to £0.8 million (2002: £0.7 million) reflecting an increased volume of transactions and higher premiums in the insurance bond market. Call centre support and customer relationship management costs increased to £4.2 million (2002: £3.7 million) as part of the drive to improve service levels and conversion rates. The introduction of enhanced technology, especially the new mid-office processing system and continued benefits of scale, along with increased use of the internet to book, will result in lower costs as a percentage of sales. Sales and marketing costs of £2.2 million (2002: £1.7 million) reflect an absolute increase in marketing spend as a result of increased commission on sales paid to white-label partners and an increase in promotion of the OnlineTravel.com brand. General administration and overhead costs increased to £3.4 million (2002: £2.8 million) reflecting the costs of expanding the senior management team and supporting infrastructure to meet increased volumes. The increase includes the head office cost of integrating acquisitions and the implementation of back-office efficiencies. We expect further operational efficiencies from the introduction of new technology solutions to our business processes. Technology and Product Development We are continually seeking to improve our technology to attract more clients and customers and convert a higher percentage of 'visitors' into transacting customers. Our investment in technology is geared to developing scaleable systems that encourage online sales at the front end and automated booking, fulfilment and settlement procedures. We remain focused on deploying our technology resources to increase the range of our products, improving the functionality of our core booking engines and providing our clients with the advantages of unique products and personalisation. Considerable enhancements have been made to our Order Processing System (OPS) to encompass all aspects of travel transaction administration across all divisions, including increased automation from ticketing robots and automated financial reconciliation of receipts and payments. A version of OPS has also been rolled out for the Asia Pacific market. A large part of our technical resource in 2003 was focussed on bedding down the acquisitions made in 2002. I am pleased to report that the systems integration has been largely completed. During the year we have further finalised the process of adapting our booking systems for third party use and we recently announced our first major contract in this area with Thomas Cook. The introduction of new search engine optimisation technology has had a significant impact on the recent growth in sales at OnlineTravel.com. Scheduled for launch early in the new year is an enhanced version of our BYO system, which will include improvements to the flights engine and access to more hotels and villas, and an improved integrated hotels solution. Acquisitions On 16th June 2003, the Company acquired the e-travel brands Deckchair.com and Leisurehunt.com for an aggregate of £150,000 in cash as a cost effective way of building market share and providing an extended user base for potential BYO customers. Deckchair.com, one of the first e-travel brands in the UK, had a database of 410,000 registered users with a profile similar to the Company's own brands OnlineTravel.com and BargainHolidays.com. A redesigned Deckchair site was launched on 19th June 2003 combining the best attributes of both sites, including a BYO capability. Leisurehunt.com had 192,000 registered users with a profile closely fitting that of OTC's main hotel site, Allhotels.com. Outlook Industry research still predicts considerable growth in the European online travel sector over the next few years, with the highest rates of growth in dynamic packaging and the online hotel sector. OTC was one of the early pioneers of dynamic packaging with its BYO technology and the launch of the new version of this technology in January 2004 is expected to maintain the Group at the forefront of this high margin, growth business. Combined with the launch of its enhanced hotels solution, this is expected to place the Company in a strong position to benefit from anticipated growth. The recent strong growth at OnlineTravel.com is very encouraging and expected to continue. The enhanced technology and search techniques which acted as a catalyst for this growth will be employed on other own brand sites including Deckchair.com, A2BTravel.com, BargainHolidays.com and Allhotels.com in 2004. An ongoing review of the Company's portfolio has highlighted some brands with lower growth potential. With systems integration complete, the Company is examining the potential to profitably dispose of some of these brands. The Company will continue to leverage its systems across multiple sales channels. The majority of sales growth in the current year has been, and is expected to continue to be, via our online booking systems, for which the incremental processing and fulfilment costs have been minimised as a result of increased automation. Flagship sites such as OnlineTravel.com and ThomasCook.com, at which a high proportion of sales are transacted online, are expected to account for a high proportion of anticipated growth. The fundraising announced today puts the Company on a sound financial footing and we are therefore confident that OTC will be able to benefit from the continued growth in the online travel sector. We look forward to reporting on our progress on the significant growth opportunities available to us from each of our sales channels. Mark Jones Chief Executive 16th December 2003 Consolidated Profit and Loss account for the year ended 31 October 2003 Year ended Year ended 31 Oct 2003 31 Oct 2002 (Unaudited) (Audited) ____________________________________________________________ Pre- Exceptional Exceptional items Items Total Total £000's £000's £000's £000's Total Transaction Value(1) 104,859 - 104,859 85,503 _________ _________ _________ _________ - Continuing 86,499 - 86,499 64,455 - Acquisitions - - - 5,804 --------- -------- --------- ---------- Group Turnover 86,499 - 86,499 70,259 Cost of sales (74,692) (325) (75,017) (60,406) _________ _________ _________ _______ Gross profit 11,807 (325) 11,482 9,853 _______ _________ _________ ________ Operating Costs Selling and distribution costs (5,783) (70) (5,853) (6,371) Administration costs (7,478) (1,623) (9,101) (4,281) Operating Costs before depreciation and goodwill amortisation (13,261) (1,693) (14,954) (10,652) EBITDA (1,454) (2,018) (3,472) (1,069) Depreciation (1,291) - (1,291) (1,418) Goodwill amortisation (500) - (500) (362) --------- -------- --------- ---------- Total Operating Costs (15,052) (1,693) (16,745) (12,432) Operating loss --------- -------- --------- ---------- - Continuing (3,245) (2,018) (5,263) (2,398) - Acquisitions (181) --------- -------- --------- ---------- Group Operating Loss (3,245) (2,018) (5,263) (2,579) Share of associate company profit 100 187 _______ _________ Group Loss on Ordinary Activities before interest and taxation (5,164) (2,392) Interest receivable 32 25 Interest payable and similar charges (808) (666) _______ _____ Group loss on ordinary activities before taxation (5,941) (3,033) Taxation (note 6) 716 473 _______ _____ Retained loss for the financial year (5,225) (2,560) _______ _______ Loss per share Pence Pence - basic (4.4) (2.7) _______ _______ - fully diluted (4.4) (2.7) _______ _______ (1) Total transaction value does not represent the group's statutory turnover and comprises amounts relating to the Group and its share of associates Consolidated Balance Sheet at 31 October 2003 As at As at 31 Oct 2003 31 Oct 2002 (Unaudited) (Audited) £000's £000's Fixed assets 8,764 8,945 Intangible assets Tangible assets 1,872 2,183 Investment in associated companies 184 238 _______ _______ Total Fixed Assets 10,820 11,366 _______ _______ Current assets --------- --------- Debtors 5,230 5,890 Cash at bank and in hand 2,508 4,173 --------- --------- 7,738 10,063 Creditors: amounts falling due within one year (10,568) (9,161) --------- --------- Net current assets/(Liabilities) (2,830) 902 _______ _______ Total Assets less current Liabilities 7,990 12,268 Creditors: amounts falling due after one year (615) (880) _______ _______ Net Assets 7,375 11,388 _______ _______ Capital and reserves 1,219 1,142 Called up share capital Share premium account 17,529 15,972 Capital reserve 1,499 1,499 Other Reserve - 391 Profit and loss account - deficit (12,872) (7,616) _______ ________ Total equity shareholders' funds 7,375 11,388 _______ _______ Consolidated Cashflow Statement for the year ended 31 October 2003 Year ended Year ended 31 Oct 2003 31 Oct 2002 £000's £000's Net cash outflow from operating activities (446) (75) DIVIDENDS FROM JOINT VENTURES AND ASSOCIATES 95 Returns on investments and servicing of finance Interest received 32 25 Interest paid (808) (666) ____ (1,222) (621) Taxation 459 - Corporation tax refunds Capital expenditure (960) (1,719) Payments to acquire tangible assets - continuing - acquisitions --- --- _______ (1,724) (2,340) Acquisitions and disposals (161) (437) Purchase of subsidiary undertaking Net cash acquired with subsidiary undertaking 655 Purchase of businesses (677) - _________ Net cash outflow before financing (2,563) (2,122) Financing 1,243 3,676 Issue of ordinary share capital - continuing Loans to associated undertakings 154 (37) New borrowings 500 Net cash inflow from financing 1,397 4,139 ________ Increase/(decrease) in cash (1,165) 2,017 Notes 1. Basis of Preparation The results incorporated in the preliminary announcement have been prepared on the basis of accounting policies consistent with previous years. The preliminary announcement was approved by the Board of directors on 15 December 2003. The figures for the year ended 31 October 2003 do not constitute full accounts within the meaning of Section 240 of the companies Act 1985 The figures for the year ended 31 October 2002 have been extracted from the accounts for 2002, which have been delivered to the registrar of companies. The auditors have reported on those accounts and their report was unqualified and did not contain statements under section 237 (2) of (3) of the Companies Act 1985. The Annual Report and Accounts for the year ended 31 October 2003 will be sent to shareholders in February 2004. 2. Loss per share 2003 2002 Attributable loss (£000's) (5,225) (2,560) ========== ========== Average number of ordinary shares in issue (000's) 117,462 93,671 ========== ========= Basic earnings (loss) per share (pence) (4.4)p (2.7)p ======== ========= Fully diluted earnings (loss) per share (pence) (4.4)p (2.7)p ======== ========= The fully diluted earnings (loss) per share takes account of outstanding share options and warrants. The calculation shows that the fully diluted loss per share is lower than the undiluted loss; in accordance with the requirements of FRS 14, this is not considered to be dilutive. 3. Reconciliation of movements in shareholders' funds 2003 2002 £000's £'000 Opening shareholders' funds 11,388 7,002 New share capital subscribed 77 332 Share premium 1,557 6,223 Other reserve (391) 391 Currency movement on opening reserves (31) Loss for the financial period (5,225) (2,560) ---------- Closing shareholders' funds 7,375 11,388 ======= ========= 4. Reconciliation of operating loss to net cash outflow from operating activities 2003 2002 £'000 £'000 Operating loss (5,264) (2,579) Depreciation of tangible fixed assets 1,291 1,418 Amortisation of goodwill 500 356 Currency movement on opening reserves (31) Decrease in debtors 918 211 Increase in creditors 2,139 519 ------- -------- Net cash outflow from operating activities (446) (75) ------- ======== 5. Reconciliation of net cash flow to movement in net cash 2003 2002 £'000 £'000 Increase/(decrease) in cash in the period (1,165) 2,017 Cash outflow from repayment of debt (500) - --------- --------- Change in net cash resulting from cash flows (1,665) 2,017 Net cash at 31 October 2002 4,173 2,156 _______ _______ Net cash at 31 October 2003 2,508 4,173 _______ _______ 6. Taxation No value is attributed to tax losses except where their recovery is reasonably certain. In the case of Research and Development tax credits, recovery is assessed as being reasonably certain when each of the following conditions is met - relevant expenditure has been incurred at the balance sheet date - there is no reason to believe that the claim would be subject to challenge by the Inland Revenue This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
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