The board of Manchester nano-technology company, Nanoco, has responded strongly to a shareholder’s call for them to be replaced.
Tariq Hamoodi, who holds around 4% of the listed company has published a 60-page presentation detailing his “significant concerns regarding corporate governance at Nanoco.”
Earlier this year, Hamoodi wrote to the company saying he was concerned “as to the competence and independence of the current board” and that he believed that “significant value” could be realised “both from the Company’s assets and by augmenting the Company’s own licensing business with capabilities to monetise intellectual property for third parties.”
However, today he stated that he said that Nanoco had “failed to adequately engage with many of his concerns and the board has refused to voluntarily stand down.”
He said that as a result of this he intended to request an EGM “to replace Nanoco’s current board with a more experienced group of independent directors with a strong track record of success and experience in intellectual property licensing and quantum dots.”
This afternoon, the tech firm released a strongly worded response to the London Stock Exchange.
“We continue to emphatically reject Mr Hamoodi’s speculative concerns. The Board welcomes scrutiny, but his misinterpretation of the past, and consciously selective and factually inaccurate disclosure, including the publication of heavily edited videos, presents a number of events out of context to create a false narrative to mislead our shareholders,” said Christopher Richards, Non-Executive Chairman of Nanoco.
“The proposed Board changes are not in the best interests of the Company or its shareholders, and would give undue influence to a disgruntled minority shareholder. Nanoco is at an exciting inflection point, with the litigation proceeds fully underpinning our organic business which has significant growth opportunities.
“Mr Hamoodi’s proposals would be damaging and disruptive to Nanoco’s future prospects and, if successful, would result in an exodus of key talent from the business.”
The company said that it had “sought to engage with Mr Hamoodi, including responding to his initial letter” but that “the Directors of Nanoco have no intention of stepping down from the Board and are confident that the Board’s actions and statements over the period of the Samsung litigation were in line with its corporate governance duties, obligations and standards.”
