New thread started as Epic changed from LAF to LONR - May 07.





Epic : LONR

Web Site : http://www.lonrho.com/


Its something different, and something exciting imo.



Nice recent Telegraph write up to (April 2007) :

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/04/04/cnlonrho04.xml


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Lonrho PLC 01 June 2007
LONRHO PLC
'Lonrho' or 'the Company'

LONRHO STRENGTHENS MANAGEMENT TEAM

Lonrho Plc ('Lonrho'), the African conglomerate with a diverse portfolio of investments ranging from infrastructure, transportation, support services and natural resources, announces today two new appointments to the management team.

Jean Ellis joins the Lonrho Board as Finance Director with immediate effect.
With 17 years experience as a Chartered Accountant and Chartered Tax Adviser; Ms Ellis is, and will remain a partner in Chartered Accountants Duncan Sheard Glass ('DSG'). Ms Ellis, 37, was previously the Group Financial Controller and Tax Manager with Lonrho Africa Plc and also held a number of Directorships for its subsidiary companies. Since joining DSG in 2002, Jean continued to act as a consultant to Lonrho, remaining closely involved with the Company's finance and taxation.

Mr Geoffrey White also joins Lonrho as the Chief Operating Officer. Mr White, 46, most recently worked for the private office of His Highness Sheikh Khalifa Al Thani, the Emir of the State of Qatar, in London. During his 25 year career, he has held senior management roles with Thomas Tilling Plc, BTR Plc and Dee Corporation PLc. He has been responsible for planning, financing, developing and managing a range of projects in the leisure, industrial and natural resource sectors. These projects include establishing joint ventures with corporations including Hilton International, Ford Motors (PAG), Praton International GmbH, FFS Refiners Pty Ltd, Sengamines Sarl, Oryx Natural Resources, African Mining Investments Ltd and Pegasus Energy Ltd.

Lonrho CEO David Lenigas commented:

'I am very pleased that as we rebuild the Company's brand and presence across Africa, the appointments of Jean and Geoffrey as Finance Director and COO respectively further strengthens our Board and management team as the rapid re-growth of Lonrho progresses.

The appointment of Mr White looks particularly interesting. I expect he has the right connections given his history. BTR was the darling of its day, which took over many companies and had an excellent growth record. Institutions made millions from that one. Infact, I believe it took over Thomas Tilling.

Agreed on Mr White.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/06/03/cnzimbabwe03.xml

Lonrho breaks taboo with Zimbabwe venture

By Sylvia Pfeifer, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 1:22am BST 03/06/2007

Investors will be given the first opportunity to invest in Zimbabwe through an innovative vehicle ....................................

Yes, this is more like it. Making an early move on Zimbabwe through the new vehicle although, perhaps contrarian, could prove extremely profitable if all goes well. I think this also reiterates the point that Magabe"s regime may be braking up behind the scenes. Mr White may be quite useful in any negotiations given his background ?Although Lonhro will be taking a major stake in Lonzim, existing holders of Lonhro may get a chance to subscribe (i.e retail investors mentioned in the article).Never a dull moment with this one a present.

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/money/investment/article1874661.ece

From The Sunday Times
June 3, 2007

Go off the beaten track

"..........and if you want exposure to Africa, you can buy shares in Lonrho, a pan-African investment company........."

The Times comment was brief. Good spot PP. We should get more UK press coverage from now on. Be interesting to see what the sp does today.

Lonrho PLC 07 June 2007

LONRHO Plc
('Lonrho' or 'the Company')

LONRHO BYTES INTO THE AFRICAN IT INDUSTRY

Lonrho is pleased to announce that it has exchanged contracts to acquire 65% of one of Mozambique's largest commercial Information Technology Solution Providers, Sociedade Comercial Bytes & Pieces, Limitada ('Bytes & Pieces'), which provides turnkey network solutions and maintenance and support to Mozambique businesses, NGO's and Government organisations. Bytes & Pieces featured at 53 in the KPMG 'Top 100 Companies in Mozambique' survey in 2004.

Bytes & Pieces is an authorized distributor of Dell equipment in Mozambique, providing Enterprise Solutions on a Dell hardware platform.

The IT company is a Microsoft Certified Partner and was awarded the System Builder Partner of the Year 2006 for East and Southern Africa. Bytes & Pieces is also an authorized distributor or value added reseller for CISCO Systems, MGE UPS Systems and Legrand networking products.

Lonrho is buying the stake in the Bytes & Pieces for $2.34m and will take up two thirds of the board positions. The two founders of Bytes & Pieces, Vijay Thadani and Veronica Miller, will together retain 35%. Bytes & Pieces recorded profits before tax of US$854,000 in 2006, on revenue of US$8.6 m.

The company now plans to expand into the region using the Bytes & Pieces model with a distribution division for high quality networking products and also with an Enterprise Solutions implementation division based upon the Dell hardware platform. The first countries in which the company will expand include South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Swaziland, Lesotho, Botswana, Namibia, Malawi and the
Democratic Republic of Congo.

Lonrho Chairman and CEO David Lenigas commented:
'As the majority shareholder in Bytes & Pieces, Lonrho intends to further build on the IT company's success and replicate the business model built up in Mozambique to the rest of Africa.'

'This acquisition is another example of Lonrho's strategy of investing in African infrastructure. We are entering into this field as it services African business with high quality IT solutions, an essential tool for helping them to
grow and prosper while keeping up with the rest of the world'

The Bytes & Pieces deal seems cheap enough. A company on the face of it worth US$3.6m earning a PBT of US$854,000 in 2006 and producing Gross profit margin of around 10%. Good to see the founders staying on board with a 35% stake. Should be some attractive growth potential given the Microsoft, Dell, Cisco etc. connections. sp 33.75p

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/06/07/cnlonrho107.xml

"Lonrho to gamble 100m in Zimbabwe fund"
By Tom Stevenson


Lonrho is to double the size of a planned Zimbabwe investment fund to meet strong demand from around the world, according to chairman David Lenigas. LonZim is now looking to raise 100m, twice the 50m it indicated earlier this week.

The company has courted controversy by offering investors a way to back economic recovery in the pariah state, where 80pc of the population is out of work and personal wealth has been destroyed by hyperinflation and social unrest.

David Lenigas, the Australian deal-maker who is engineering a renaissance at the Aim-listed rump of Tiny Rowland's former business empire, is unapologetic about the move into Zimbabwe.

"My vision is that Lonrho puts hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans back to work with reasonable pay and a future for their families. Up until a few years ago, Lonrho was the biggest employer in Zimbabwe and my job is to make Lonrho as big again as it was, as quickly as possible."
Since the arrival of Mr Lenigas, Lonrho has grown rapidly through the acquisition of stakes in water bottling, air cargo and low-cost passenger airline services. The company will today announce the acquisition of a 65pc stake in Mozambique's biggest commercial IT distributor. "This is another example of Lonrho's strategy of investing in Africa's infrastructure," Mr Lenigas said. "It's an essential tool for helping them to grow and prosper while keeping up with the rest of the world."

But its Zimbabwean venture is its biggest gamble yet. Because of the high risks, it is setting up LonZim as a separate business in which it will probably take a stake of only about 20pc plus a management contract.
"Do I want to give Lonrho shareholders 100 cents to the dollar risky exposure to Zimbabwe? No. Because you don't know how long the money's going to be locked up," he warned. "It's buyer beware. You give us 100m and you have to trust that we have enough business acumen to put those funds to work in a proper fashion."

Under the catastrophic rule of Robert Mugabe, inflation has soared to 3,700pc and four in five Zimbabweans live on less than $1 a day. According to economic and political analysts Global Insight, "the economic and social meltdown is expected to continue over the short term and GDP is expected to contract by around 5pc in 2007".

Despite the scale of the crisis, foreign investors are queuing up to take a position ahead of any post-Mugabe regime. Mr Lenigas believes he could raise much more than 100m but would struggle to deploy the funds. "Collins Stewart [Lonrho's broker] said it had never seen such a response to a concept. The phones are running hot," he said.

Initially, investment will mainly be in property. "Commercial property is cheap as chips, the infrastructure in Harare is fantastic but it's fire-sale prices," he added. "We also see a big market in residential property and resorts and game parks too. As the economy in Zimbabwe grows, and it will do, the tourists will come back. Tourism is going to be one of the first areas that opens up in a revitalised Zimbabwe."

Recovery is not imminent. This week the Zimbabwean government signed a wage and price protocol with business and labour groups designed to bring the monthly rise in inflation down to 25pc from the current 100pc. But as Global Insight said: "It remains to be seen if all parties that signed the agreement will adhere to the conditions, not least the government."

If Mr Lenigas makes a success of Lonrho's re-entry to Zimbabwe, it will mark a return to the company's roots. Originally the London and Rhodesia Mining and Land Company, Lonrho remains a household name in Africa and Tiny Rowland is still revered.

Mr Lenigas hopes many of Lonrho's former staff will return. "There aren't many people living or working in Africa who haven't either worked for Lonrho in the past, or their father or uncle worked for us."

There will be some tricky negotiations going on in order to protect any investment in a post Magabe regime. Very interesting to see the amount of demand for the LonZim idea so if you follow the money you come to the conclusion that there is every incentive for government change. Personally, I would be more inclined to buy Lonhro rather than Lonzim given the former's diverse interests.

Mackenzie Cundill Inv Man (first referred to in previous old LAF thread) has increased stake from 9.38% to 11.11%. sp up 1p to 34.5p

Keeps on moving up :)

Lonrho PLC 19 June 2007
LONRHO PLC
('Lonrho' or 'the Company')

Lonrho plans to develop new airline in Angola

Lonrho (AIM: LONR) has signed an exclusive Memorandum of Understanding ('MOU') with Sociedade De Gestate E Participacoes Financieras SARL ('GEFI'), one of the largest internal investment companies in Angola.

Lonrho plans to develop a new airline in Angola for the passenger, freight, leasing and charter markets with GEFI, through their wholly owned subsidiary Planar, an aircraft operating agency, that currently owns warehousing and office facilities at Luanda airport. GEFI also owns further facilities throughout the country, including the required flight permissions and licences to operate the new airline.

Lonrho's exposure within the aviation sector puts it in a strong position to manage the new airline. Subsidiaries include the Budget airline Fly 540 operating in East Africa and Norse Air, an aviation logistics company operating across a number of countries.

The MOU provides a three month exclusive period for the parties to review the opportunities in the Angolan aviation market and structure and commence the development of the new airline.

David Lenigas, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Lonrho, commented:

'Today's announcement is another example of Lonrho's strategy of investing into African infrastructure. The MOU with GEFI should allow Lonrho to develop a new airline to support Angola's strong economy, which is being aided by accelerated growth from oil and diamond revenues.

By partnering with GEFI, and its established infrastructure, we envisage that Lonrho will utilise its expertise and build on its aviation network. We believe that the new airline can rapidly become a significant part of an expanding domestic market in Angola and a buoyant natural resources market across Africa.

Finally, Lonrho believes that good aviation services provide one of the fundamental legs of the infrastructure that Africa requires to grow.'

Lovely moves today :)

The tie up with GEFI looks interesting with the latter owning various aviation assets in Angola. The Memo of Understanding will give the two parties time to evaluate the business before commiting further. sp is up 9% to 38.5p. Given the 1.5million share turnover, can only assume mms are a bit short of stock.

sp 39.25p. May be felt in some quarters that sp begining to get ahead of itself but, more institutions will wish to get on board as the situation develops.

Just for the record:- 22 June 2007
LONRHO PLC
('Lonrho' or the 'Company')

Increase in Nare Diamonds Shareholding


Lonrho (AIM: LONR), the African conglomerate with a diverse portfolio of
investments ranging from infrastructure, transportation, support services and
natural resources, announces today that it has increased its shareholding in
Nare Diamonds Limited ('Nare') to 23,194,352 Ordinary Shares which represents
20.26% of the issued share capital of Nare. This is an increase in Lonrho's
shareholding from 19.05%.

RIO is the best managed.

Reported on Reuters 27/6/07 that Magabe is threatening to seize foreign businesses and assets that he says have raised prices and cut output in order to oust his government.He accuses Britain of trying to overthrow him. Full article on reuters.com and then type "Zimbabwe" in search section.

Seems to me to be a deparate statement from a desparate man. He is bringing his own downfall. sp has ticked up to 40p.