AGM Statement

Artisan (UK) PLC 17 September 2002 For immediate release 17 September 2002 Artisan (UK) plc ('Artisan' or the 'Company') AGM Chairman's Statement On the occasion of Artisan's fourth AGM, it gives me great pleasure to be making my first statement as your Company's Chairman. Your Board's goals, simply put, are the following: • To reverse the deterioration in the Market Value of the Company • To increase profits and earnings per share • To improve the quality of assets • To build a substantial international property development business We believe that the impending transaction involving the acquisition of a partly pre-let development opportunity for approx 45,000 m2 of offices in France, is a positive step forward. At this juncture I would like to take the opportunity to give you a little bit of background on myself. I have spent 20 years in property and in particular property development on an international basis. The great majority of the developments I have been involved in have been in the United States, predominately Manhattan and France. In Manhattan a number of these developments were residential which included the St James Tower and in France a mixture of commercial office and warehouse developments. I aim to build a large focused international property business over the coming years and this is the main reason why I have become Chairman of Artisan. To further this aim we are setting up a new vehicle, Artisan International, under the stewardship of Alain Brion. Alain was the former Group Managing Director of Total, and his role will be to explore development opportunities in continental Europe. It is my view that within the development sector there will be substantial consolidation and I believe that Artisan is the platform to enable us to acquire a number of these companies. This course of action will take time and the current year is highly dependent on the timescale of when certain projects and developments complete. To this end I will be devoting my energies to building Artisan into a Company that we can all be proud of. Current Year The prospects for the coming year are dependent on the timescale for the implementation of the strategic programme and the accounting for the proposed acquisitions. The two main existing businesses of Rippon Homes and Artisan Developments are in line to generate the budgeted turnover, consistent with levels from continuing operations over the previous two years although increased land prices are putting pressure on margins. Trading income, however, will be insufficient to cover overhead and financing costs in the first half of the year due to the phased production and turnover cycle in the development company - where income is significantly biased towards the second half of the year - and because in particular, sales of the completed offices in St. Ives have not yet been completed. However we expect a positive outcome for the year as a whole. The Board has recently been strengthened by the appointment of John Hemingway who has had a long and distinguished career as an institutional pension fund investor with UBS Philips & Drew and latterly experience in property development including a ten acre housing development in the South East and 110,000 ft(2) of office development in Lambeth, London. It is my intention to further strengthen the Board and we have identified a number of other possible candidates. We aim to make a further announcement regarding the Board in due course. Outlook It is the Company's aim to continue to increase its core UK business of residential and commercial property development by merger and acquisition as well as developing an international business, moving into larger higher-profile developments. We are currently in negotiations on a number of major transactions, including as referred to earlier the 500,000 ft(2) office development at Massy near Paris. We hope to give further details on this and other developments in the near future. We are very committed to pursuing an aggressive merger and acquisition policy and have the support of our bankers and other major investors to ensure that the necessary facilities are in place to provide your Company with the additional resources and flexibility it needs to achieve these goals. Remuneration Committee It is my intention to work with the Remuneration Committee of your Board to develop a more formal incentivisation and remuneration scheme to ensure that senior management are properly incentivised. The key objective is that a significant element of management's remuneration is directly linked to the profits and earnings per share and to the achievement of the aims of the Company and its shareholders that I have outlined above. Finally I would like to thank the management and in particular the Executive Directors for rising to the challenge and I am looking forward to working with them and the Board and Management to develop Artisan's business as it moves into a new phase. In accordance with the assurances given to the board when I was invited to join, I confirm that it remains my intention to support this expansion programme by initially subscribing, through Aspen Finance Ltd, for up to 50 million new shares in the company and also through procuring and underwriting further investment from institutional and other investors. I am committed to working for the benefit of all shareholders and I am determined to create shareholder value. To aid the process of communication Artisan will be developing an interactive website to answer shareholders questions. All resolutions were duly passed and agreed. Michael Stevens Chairman For further information please contact, Artisan (UK) plc 01480 43 66 66 Martyn Freeman, Chief Executive Chris Musselle, Finance Director Takki Sulaiman/Ben Simons 020 7735 9415 Hansard Communications 07778 419 218 This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
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