Placing and Open Offer Result
Creston PLC
03 March 2005
3 March 2005
Creston Plc ("Creston" or the "Company")
Result of Placing and Open Offer
On 9 February 2005, Creston, the marketing services and communications group,
announced the acquisition of Face Communications Limited, the ultimate parent
company of the DLKW Group, and 26 per cent. of the issued share capital of DLKW
Holdings (the other 74 per cent. being already owned by Face Communications),
together with a Placing and Open Offer of 7,048,164 new ordinary shares at a
price of 145 pence per new ordinary share to raise approximately £9.5 million
(net of expenses).
The Board is pleased to announce that, following the closing of the Open Offer
at 3.00 p.m on 2 March 2005 valid applications have been received from
Qualifying Shareholders for all of the 2,158,666 new ordinary shares available
for take up under the Open Offer by Qualifying Shareholders.
The Company received irrevocable undertakings from Directors and certain other
shareholders not to subscribe for all or part of their pro-rata entitlements
under the open offer in respect of 989,498 new ordinary shares and these shares
were placed firm by Charles Stanley & Co. Limited with institutional investors.
The Placing and Open Offer remains conditional, inter alia, upon the approval of
the Company's shareholders. The extraordinary general meeting, at which
resolutions will be proposed to approve the Placing and Open Offer together with
the acquisition of Face Communications and the remaining 26 per cent of DLKW
Holdings, is to be held on 4 March 2005.
The new ordinary shares will rank pari passu in all respects with the existing
ordinary shares and will rank in full for dividends and other distributions
declared, made or paid after Admission. Application has been made to the UK
Listing Authority for the new ordinary shares to be admitted to the Official
List of the UK Listing Authority and to the London Stock Exchange plc for the
new ordinary shares to be admitted to trading on the London Stock Exchange's
market for listed securities. It is expected that Admission will take place and
dealings will commence in the new ordinary shares on Wednesday, 9 March 2005.
Enquiries
Creston Plc 020 7930 9757
Don Elgie, Chief Executive
Barrie Brien, COO & CFO
Charles Stanley & Co. Limited 020 7953 2000
Mark Taylor
Redleaf Communications 020 7955 1410
Emma Kane
NOTES TO EDITORS:
About Creston Plc
• Creston's strategy is to build a diversified international marketing
services group through a combination of organic growth and selective
acquisitions. The Board's aim is to identify synergistic benefits between
currently independent marketing services companies offering premium
services such as market research, direct marketing, customer relationship
marketing, advertising and other areas of marketing communications.
About The DLKW Group
• The DLKW Group is an advertising and communications group based in Covent
Garden in London, which employs 157 people on a full time basis. The DLKW
Group has a diverse range of clients and has a number of large blue chip
clients, which include HBOS, Vauxhall, Burger King, Exxon, eBay,
Batchelors, Capital Radio, The Financial Times, Premier Foods and COI
Communications, the communications agency of HM Government, one of the
largest spenders on marketing communications in the UK. The DLKW Group is
the only agency to feature in Campaign magazine's Business Growth Top 5 in
each of the past three years and is one of the largest independent UK
advertising and communications agencies.
Charles Stanley & Co. Limited which is authorised and regulated by the
Financial Services Authority and is a member of the London Stock Exchange,
is acting exclusively for Creston in connection with the Placing and Open
Offer and the acquisition of Face Communications and is not acting for any
person other than Creston and will not be responsible to any person other
than Creston for providing the protections afforded to its customers or for
providing advice on the transactions and arrangements proposed in this
announcement.
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange