After taking over Parkman, and taking Parkman Chief Executive Richard Cuthbert, Mouchel's share price has dropped, fuelled mainly by the reported costs of the merger. Preliminary results for the year to July will be published in October. for

However the merger costs are 'one-off's' and the new organisation is stronger (and claims it will make further acquistions). Is it ready for take-off in the run-up to the publication of accounts?

Stan, this is what ive copied off of investigate for next results..

The Group will announce its preliminary results for the year ended 31 July 2009 on Tuesday 6 October 2009.

Heres that article I was talking about earlier from the Saturday Express Market Report ..David Shand.....

" while consulting group Mouchel firmed 24 3/4p to 246p, on suggestions it could be a target for private equity..... ends.

Mouchel charts are appearing to be very positive....

Especially as results are due on Tuesday 6th of October.

Even if you take away this speculative Takeover talk you are still getting a chart that screams out bullish positive TA and what appears to be a great deal of momentum behind the stocks SP.....



Short term chart shows just how positive this one has been over the last few days..

Could see a nice ride up before results.

Just to let you know have dipped my toe in the water with these, they absorbed some major one-offs this year which hammered the price, mostly to do with M East, long term, well not recovered much yet, so , 250p is on the cards, this is a sound business!

? looking good!

Obviously, if we break 200p well you know the rest, in fact am hoping for 300p, before results whioch from memory are next Feb, so lots of momentum to go. If their markets pick-up more, who knows, but I do like the look of this.

Wanted to add more at 150, was convinced this was a good business and almost recession proof, ie infrastuctire markets are still buyont, but alas didnt! thought I'd misjudged it! oh well will have to make do with just a 50% rise on a very small holding. Maybe theres bid speculation, that rise on the back of a hold and a cuatious buy note seems a bit excessive?

Maybe I should read the press releases, doh! at least VT group agree with me though!

Standard Life made a nice little profit on these by the looks of it, selling 76,000 @ GBP 2.45.

Was away over the w/e so missed this:

"Mouchel, an outsourcing and engineering group whose shares jumped nearly 20% on Friday, has received two secret takeover approaches. The rival VT Group is understood to have made both informal offers in recent weeks, only to be rebuffed by Mouchels board, led by its chairman, Bo Lerenius. Serco and Capita, two other outsourcing groups, are said to be waiting in the wings if a formal bid materialises, reports the Sunday Times."

This is almost back to what Mouchel paid in their takeover ... sorry, 'merger' ....

I have no interest in this stockbut just had to saygood to see you back Bertand may every punt be a winning one

Hi Tab.... Still alive, just do very little trading these days.

I had a personal interest in this one from way back (Parkman days)...... When Mouchel took over, any who disagreed with dubious business plans got forced out ...... plan was to over-hype then sell on - looks like they forgot to find a seller before getting found out :-) ..... Just not sure how much of the old engineering business is left to salvage....

Good luck to you BertYer a good un!

The Mail are reporting any deal would be conditional on a deal with the banks - if thats the case the takeout price would be much higher than current levels.

Mouchel ripe for a bid after shares slide
By Simon Neville
7 December 2010, 8:32am

Struggling outsourcing firm Mouchel Group revealed it was being eyed for a potential takeover after a series of recent profit warnings wiped nearly 300m off the company's value compared to a year ago.

Mouchel said government spending cuts will hit business, adding that the collapse of its share price in the last few weeks 'has resulted in recent approaches'.

But it added: 'The board does not believe that these preliminary approaches reflect the true value of the company.' Last week bosses were forced to bring in restructuring specialists from auditor Deloitte at the behest of its biggest creditors, sending shares down 15%.

But yesterday shares rebounded 15.75p to 72.25p on the back of the takeover rumours, with any deal conditional on the firm negotiating the refinancing on its 180m credit facilities, which are ongoing.

Public sector business accounts for 87% of Mouchel's work, which includes contracts for motorway maintenance and road gritting services.

Rival VT Group offered to pay 250p a share for Mouchel a year ago, but the company rebuffed the approach.



Read more: http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/markets/article.html?in_article_id=519445&in_page_id=3#ixzz17PkANaCS

Just thinking the SP is almost low enough for the board to pop up with a MBO, and there goes one of them stuffing a few in his sky on the cheap .... more to follow?

I'm not sure what the mentality of the management is here. They seem the clear losers from the failed MCHL/IRV/COST love triangle - with IRV seemingly coming off best.

15 June 2011

Mouchel Group plc

Interim Management Statement

Mouchel Group plc ("Mouchel" or the "Group"), the consulting and business services group, today provides its Interim Management Statement covering the period to 14 June 2011, ahead of its year-end trading update which is expected to be issued at the beginning of August 2011.

Performance in the year to date

Mouchel holds leading positions in the UK highways and local authority outsourcing markets. We have a focussed strategy and great client relationships, and remain confident about the Group's medium and long-term prospects. However, conditions continue to be very challenging in these markets as the majority of our clients are undergoing budget cuts and internal restructuring.

Underlying trading is in line with our expectations. In addition, during the year we have negotiated commercial conclusions to a number of contracts, including our exit from certain activities. Some of these negotiations have led to higher costs or lower profitability than originally expected, although these have been offset by a significant one-off gain on one of our long-term contracts.

In Government and Business Services, our business process outsourcing (BPO) activities are in demand, with almost every local authority pursuing service transformation strategies, rather than simply cost savings and service cuts. An increasing number of councils are looking to private sector partnership and risk sharing. Whilst our work in the local authority property sector has been scaled back considerably as a result of the reductions in school building, refurbishment and maintenance expenditure, there is greater stability in our long-term contracts and service partnerships - these contracts are also our best source of growth, as a result of service expansion or extension.

In Management Consulting, the visibility of forward workload is poor and the market for our services continues to be depressed. Our strategy of working with our local authority partnership contracts to transform services however is providing benefits and these, together with our well-established, long-term contracts with the Departments of Health, have helped to sustain performance, though below our original expectations.

In Highways, our maintenance joint ventures in England and Scotland and now in Australia are performing strongly. However, our local authority contracts and technology work with the Highways Agency (HA) have all been adversely impacted by the significant spending cuts, especially in discretionary and capital works programmes.

In Regulated Industries, our workload with the water companies continues to increase as AMP5 capital programmes progress through feasibility and design stages. Our environment teams work closely with the highways business and have therefore been scaled back in line with the reductions in that market. In the Middle East performance is stable though the Abu Dhabi market remains slow.

Order book

The overall level of bidding activity has been lower than in previous periods and our ability to secure new orders was adversely impacted by the Offer Period which ran from December 2010 to April 2011. This means, as previously reported, that the Group's win rate in the current financial year will be below our target range.

However, we have been successful in securing nearly GBP200m of new contracts and extensions in the year to date. In the second half, the most notable of these has been the National Traffic Information Service (NTIS), in joint venture with Thales UK, for the HA. This seven year contract, initially worth GBP57m, is central to the HA's role of managing traffic and making the most efficient use of the existing strategic road network.

The Group's order book at the end of May stood at GBP1.5bn, compared with GBP1.9bn at the same time last year. Whilst lower than in the past, the order book provides excellent visibility of the Group's forward workload and we are making progress in rebuilding momentum.

The five year extension to our BPO partnership with Middlesbrough Council commenced on 1 June 2011, and is worth approximately GBP70m to the Group. The extension provides for significantly improved profitability and reduced risk compared with the first ten years of the contract.

Overseas, we have now signed, in joint venture with Downer, all three of our highways maintenance contracts with Main Roads Western Australia, with work having started on two and with the third now in the mobilisation phase. We will benefit from a full year's revenue of over GBP25m from these contracts in 2011/12. In the Middle East, we have won a number of highway design and infrastructure planning contracts in Saudi Arabia.

Pipeline

Our pipeline, which includes only tenders where we have been short-listed to bid together with contract extensions, currently stands at GBP2.0bn (as it was at the end of January and at this time last year). However, and as expected, the number of opportunities in our core markets is beginning to rise, following the very soft market conditions that we experienced through the much of 2010 and the first quarter on this year, exacerbated by the Offer Period.

Following its review by the Department of Transport, we have now moved into the final stages of the Sheffield PFI highways maintenance contract tender where we are, in joint venture with Carillion, one of two remaining bidders. If successful, this contract will be worth GBP2bn to the JV over 25 years. We are also bidding for highway maintenance contracts in Scotland and have recently been short-listed for the HA's Asset Support Contract (ASC) for Area 10 in the north-west of England.

We are already positioning for the significant number of UK local authority highways tenders which will come to market next year and our successful DownerMouchel JV is pursuing additional highway maintenance contract opportunities that will arise elsewhere in Australia in 2012.

Our pipeline of BPO opportunities is increasing significantly as a number of local authorities are now coming to market for "long and large" bundled service partnerships with the private sector. Given the scale of these opportunities, we are focussing only on those where we believe that we have competitive advantage. We have half a dozen live prospects, with the same number in the early stages of procurement.

In addition, we are working with all of our existing BPO partners in order to help them transform services, increase efficiency and service quality and bring down costs. We expect our contracts in Bournemouth, Lincolnshire, Rochdale and Oldham to expand in 2011/12.

In total we are currently tracking prospects worth GBP1.6bn which lie outside of our bidding pipeline.

Costs and cash

The actions taken in the first half to reduce staff numbers and offices have proved successful, with significant reductions in our cost base. We continue to take opportunities to improve our efficiency and delivery, particularly through the creation of fewer larger centres of excellence and smaller offices offering local client services. Our new shared service centre has opened in Oldham and this is expected to bring further benefits to our operational efficiency and cost base.

Net bank borrowings at the end of May were GBP109m, compared with GBP97m at the half year. The average for the four months to the end of May was GBP109m, compared with GBP111m in the first half of the current financial year.

Under the terms of our bank refinancing, we have total facilities of GBP170m extending to 31 March 2014. We are executing our debt reduction plan which leads to a voluntary repayment of GBP30m by the end of May 2012, principally through improvements in working capital and non-core disposals.

Outlook

The short-term outlook for the Group continues to be very challenging and is heavily influenced by the steps the Coalition government is taking to rapidly bring down the deficit in public spending. Local government, which makes up more than two-thirds of our client base, has been particularly hard hit by the unexpected speed and depth of these cuts. Our response to these conditions has been to focus on those items under our control, namely our client relationships, our cash position and our cost base. We have successfully refinanced and right sized the Group, and this process continues as we bring innovation to the way we deliver services and advice to clients. We do not however anticipate a significant improvement in trading conditions in the short-term.

The fundamentals of our business and the medium to long-term opportunities for the Group remain strong. With banking facilities in place to 2014 and with our leading market positions in local government outsourcing, public sector consulting, highways and water, we are well placed to work with organisations across the UK public sector - and in selected overseas markets - to improve the quality and efficiency of public services. In an environment where all of our clients are facing the challenge of delivering higher quality services more efficiently, our skills in transforming essential services and sustaining vital infrastructure will always be in demand.

Accordingly, we remain confident in the medium and long-term prospects for the Group.

Directorate Change.

Mouchel Group plc ("Mouchel" or the "Group"), the consulting and business services group, today announces that Rod Harris has been appointed to succeed David Tilston as Group Finance Director.