Milestone Group PLC Milestone Group Plc : Agm Statement

 
TIDMMSG 
 
   MILESTONE GROUP PLC 
 
   ("Milestone" or the "Company") 
 
   AGM Statement 
 
   At the Annual General Meeting of the Company to be held at 11:00 today, 
Deborah White, Chairman will make the following statement:- 
 
   CHAIRMAN'S INTRODUCTION 
 
   The Board would like to take this opportunity to update shareholders on 
a number of strategic and commercial developments across the Company. 
 
   NEXSTAR 
 
   In line with the focus of developing Milestone into a digital media and 
technology business, the Company recently expanded its technology 
capability with an extension to its existing arrangement with Black 
Cactus Holdings Limited. The result of which sees the Nexstar joint 
venture obtaining the global exclusive rights to market and 
commercialise the current IP developed and owned by Black Cactus. 
 
   Nexstar's suite of technology-based products focuses on two verticals - 
media publishing & distribution and Fintech, both having significant 
addressable growth markets whilst being complementary to the Company's 
target audience of young people and Passion Project partner distribution 
network. 
 
   Since the year-end there have been a number of developments with several 
key product components now completed. These include - in media 
publishing & distribution, the Alchemy platform which was officially 
launched at the Apprenticeships4England annual event in March 2017, 
followed by Nexstar's first stand-alone integrated Social Media and 
Analytics tool, which enables in-depth analysis of social media 
performance across multiple platforms with enhanced royalty tracking 
functionality for its music publishing and distribution services 
scheduled for delivery over the next few weeks. 
 
   Since the year end Nexstar also entered into a joint venture with Self 
Made, a UK-based music company. The objective of the JV is to combine 
Self Made's music industry experience and growing body of music artists 
with Nexstar's music publishing, distribution and analytics platform. 
Nexstar owns 51% of the JV, which will generate revenue from an initial 
set-up fee from the artist along with an ongoing royalty payment of 
between 15% and 25% of each purchase or stream of the content by 
visitors to the artist's site or third party services including iTunes, 
Google Play, Deezer, Spotify, Tidal and more. 
 
   On the Fintech side there have been significant technical and 
operational developments resulting from an extension of the Black Cactus 
partnership with Benefits on Madison, Inc in Toronto, Canada in late 
2016. This extension has provided Nexstar with the opportunity to offer 
its clients an attractive and growing range of exciting additional 
products and services encapsulated in an offering called "BankHub". 
 
   BankHub has been developed as a cash management treasury platform that 
provides backend services to banking institutions, both domestically and 
internationally. The system is able to manage a wide array of financial 
transactions, including deposits, transfers, cheque cashing, ACH, Check 
21, SWIFT Transfers, AML and KYC compliance. 
 
   The product was developed to optimize payment efficiency, to automate 
and keep track of a large volume of transactions, reducing the 
timeframes between payment and cash availability. BankHub tracks every 
transaction and assembles all management tasks under one platform to 
monitor activity for reporting and business intelligence purposes. The 
technology is available and easily adapted to any type and size of 
business, which in turn helps them become more competitive and 
innovative. 
 
   As notified in recent announcements Nexstar is in the process of 
embedding blockchain technology into the product development roadmaps of 
both verticals, which positions Nexstar to leverage the benefits and 
advantages for both current and future Nexstar clients especially as 
blockchain becomes more widely adopted throughout the Fintech and Media 
industries. 
 
   Black Cactus / Nexstar's development uses Ethereum, a decentralized 
platform that runs smart contracts: applications that run exactly as 
programmed without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud or 
third party interference whilst rendering intermediaries obsolete. 
 
   The implementation phase of the pre paid contracts announced in late 
2016 coincided with the expansion of the Fintech division's product 
offering and as a result the clients requested that the solutions be 
reviewed to better suit their longer term requirements and objectives. 
The availability of the additional features detailed earlier including 
international transfers and other Forex capabilities has required 
additional time and resource to be dedicated to the project. This change 
of functional specification has resulted in delays in the activation 
timetable.  The clients are currently proceeding through the BankHub 
activation process and the Company will announce when activation occurs. 
 
   Nexstar is now generating initial revenues from its media suite of 
products both from media publishing and distribution. The Company 
announced its first publishing deal with Amazon Prime for the film 
"Brash Young Turks" in October 2016, which it expects to follow with 
further film publishing deals during 2017. Although that the revenues 
generated at present are modest, the Company expects these to grow as 
its media suite of products gain traction in the market. 
 
   PASSION PROJECT 
 
   The Passion Project pilot engagement programme 'Divert', which is run by 
the Milestone Foundation in conjunction with the Metropolitan Police has 
secured GBP100k to support delivery in Brixton and Bethnal Green, with a 
further GBP100k committed subject to due diligence. It is anticipated 
that the project will develop across London providing the Company with a 
marketplace for the development of additional education and training 
products. 
 
   MOBILE SOLUTIONS 
 
   The product range continues to expand the number of registered users, 
with recent contract renewals with Charlton Athletic Community Football 
Trust and STM security. The functionality offered, whilst being of 
significant operational value, also facilitates the capture of key data 
providing valuable evidence of engagement and outcomes, essential when 
looking to secure potential grant or social impact funding.  This 
functionality is being developed by the Company for use by the Milestone 
Foundation as part of the management and delivery of the Divert 
programme. 
 
   RELATIVE 
 
   The Company's in house digital agency is now actively engaging with 
external clients as a result of the referrals generated through a 
growing pipeline with recent contract wins helping to build revenues for 
the Group. 
 
   DISORDER MAGAZINE 
 
   Following the appointment of Oliver Horton as Editor in April 2016, the 
magazine re-launched in October 2016 with its Winter issue, alongside a 
updated website.  This was followed up by the Spring release in February 
2017, with the magazine now available and generating sales via online 
purchases for the first time having established an audience both here in 
the UK and in the US. 
 
   DEVELOPMENT STAGE COMPLETE 
 
   The Board is pleased with the developments during the period and 
particularly since the period end. Each of the separate business 
offerings has begun validation of their revenue potential with growing 
interest being shown from an expanding customer base and further new 
revenue streams visible in the near future. 
 
   We are at an exciting juncture with revenue generation across the 
Company gaining traction and I look forward to updating shareholders on 
our progress. 
 
   For further information 
 
 
 
 
Milestone Group PLC 
Deborah White, Chief Executive                     Tel: [phone] 
 
Cairn Financial Advisers LLP, Nominated Adviser 
Liam Murray/Sandy Jamieson                         Tel: [phone] 
 
Hybridan LLP, Broker 
Claire Louise Noyce                                Tel: [phone] 
 
Walbrook PR Limited, PR 
Gary Middleton/Paul Cornelius/Paul Whittington     Tel: [phone] 
 
 
 
   This announcement is distributed by Nasdaq Corporate Solutions on behalf 
of Nasdaq Corporate Solutions clients. 
 
   The issuer of this announcement warrants that they are solely 
responsible for the content, accuracy and originality of the information 
contained therein. 
 
   Source: Milestone Group PLC via Globenewswire 
 
 
  http://www.milestonegroup.co.uk/ 
 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 30, 2017 05:12 ET (09:12 GMT)

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