Time now for all us Wiggins watchers to move with the times and start using Planestation, the new company identity. The name Wiggins Group plc has now disappeared from the database at Companies House and Planestation is now listed on the LSE website.

So fellow travellers, forget Wiggins, the name of the game is now PLANESTATION. Lets hope it goes like an express train.

jeffmack

Mr May was a little bit ambiguous.
Maybe Mr May is damping down expectations to make the price look good when he gets it.

I have heard it said that he wants to get rid of small shareholders so he would quite like it if we gave up & let the big boys & him have our shares for a low price.

Thought I had posted this yesterday! Edmond Jackson's comments yesterday

Edmond Jackson: unhappy with PlaneStation
PlaneStation, the property/airports group in which I own shares, has raised some 5 million via a placing to provide working capital for EUjet, a discount regional airline.


After taking a 30% interest last May, PlaneStation (PTG) has now entered into an option agreement to wholly acquire EUjet.


I am wary this is a defensive move. Last year EUjet appeared to have a challenging time raising venture capital to get off the ground. Clearly these two companies' fortunes are intertwined: EUjet now appears critical to the future of Kent International Airport (Manston), which has just lost MK, its principal cargo customer. Today's trading update gives no indication even of prospects of this cargo business being replaced.


I can well appreciate that 'in order to manage and control the investment required to develop EUjet, the directors have concluded it is in the company's best interests to enter into an option to take control of EUjet'. P J McGoldrick, founder and chief executive, will join the PlaneStation board when the group exercises its option.


At least he is contributing 500,000 out of a total 875,000 from EUjet shareholders to provide 'immediate' working capital (suggesting it is tight). But he is an entrepreneur with money he can afford to lose and is deeply involved personally. I don't see McGoldrick's investment as reflecting worthwhile fundamentals, yet. Notice that Martin May, PlaneStation's chief executive, negotiated share options rather than bought shares in the parent company. Shrewdly, he is not exposed to the financial downside.


The statement makes plain the 'ongoing financial support that EUjet will require as it establishes further routes and introduces additional aircraft'. A current review of EUjet's business plan 'may have an effect on ongoing working capital requirements' though I wonder whether the business is not going to plan.


Today's statement shows how the limited insight possible at last week's AGM was quite flawed.


One shareholder expressed publicly to the board his impression from the meeting that actions to cut costs and prioritise revenues meant the group appeared to be approaching break-even; that this was a genuine prospect for 2005. None of the directors qualified this view. But today's statement flags an uncertain scenario for cash flow, making a bald point that 'income from the activities at KIA and the group's other airports is not sufficient to meet its operating costs.' Various property sales are hoped to raise some 10.8 million before 31 March 2005 (the group's financial year-end).


Not surprisingly the placing price has been struck at 4.65p a share (thus 111.2 million new shares), a fair discount from recent levels. This may explain why the shares have been falling from a 6p area.


I am perturbed at the apparent mismatch in information flow. Just recently two separate fund managers implored bearish views to me, as reason to sell, albeit on a rationale of poor progress with a property asset in Liverpool. Martin May denied this at last week's AGM. Perhaps I should have simply recognised bearish stances coinciding, as a hint.


I find I am 'behind the curve' interpreting PlaneStation, not least because management has declined to discuss the business with me - even though it must have given fund managers a thorough exposition, to raise capital and negotiate its pricing. To an extent I recognise a difficulty engaging anyone media related, at such a time. But at the AGM the chairman was less keen for me to speak with management before Christmas. It is an unsatisfactory basis for me to follow this high-risk share, lending it credibility with the public.


I will retain a holding in PlaneStation, still in good profit. A 1 for 15 share consolidation is designed to increase the appeal to institutions. This is indeed a share for professionals: specifically hands-on venture capitalists with a direct line to management.

7 arrivals and 7 departures sceduled for today, if the passenger loads are above break even? that is not bad for Sunday.

A Manston local has reported that the Milan Bergamo route has been chopped before it starts and that Copenhagen service will cease after 28th Sept.

This news not yet confirmed but if true illustrates that EUjet is prepared to take hard decisions.

Bust before end of year

Jeffmack - do you mean Planestation or Eujet going bust?

Eujet, just personal opinion

Independent 25 September 2004

Airport owner looks up with budget airline buy
By Michael Harrison Business Editor

Planestation, the owner of Manston airport in Kent, agreed yesterday to buy EUjet, the no-frills airline which began services from there at the start of the month.

The deal values the budget airline at 4.5m and makes PlaneStation the first airport operator in the world to control its own airline.

PlaneStation already owned a 30 per cent stake in EUjet, which it acquired in May in return for a 2m cash injection. Now it is buying up a further 62 per cent of the airline by issuing 2.5m worth of share options to EUjet's founder and controlling shareholder, PJ McGoldrick, and its chairman, Ron Haylock.

The group also announced that it has raised 5.2m through a share placing to provide working capital for the development of EUjet, which hopes eventually to be carrying 2 million passengers a year.

Mr McGoldrick and Mr Haylock, who made his fortune building up a timeshare business, have been given warrants over 55.4 million PlaneStation shares which are exercisable at 4.7p in three years depending on certain performance conditions being met. The main one is that PlaneStation shares outperform the market by 25 per cent over the three-year period. Mr McGoldrick is also required to contribute 500,000 (340,000) in working capital to EUjet and will join the board of PlaneStation.

Martin May, the chief executive of PlaneStation, admitted that vertical integration of the type represented by this deal had "gone out with the Ark" but he forecast it would make a comeback as airport operators and airlines sought to secure their future. "We are asset rich and EUjet has a revenue stream so putting the two businesses together at this stage in the cycle makes sense," he added. "As a result of this deal, EUjet has a future for ever at Manston."

EUjet has begun flights to 11 destinations from Manston (now known as Kent International Airport), including Amsterdam, Dublin, Prague and Nice, using two Fokker 100 jets. It plans to double its fleet and route network by Easter. So far it has sold 40,000 seats.

Mr McGoldrick said load factors were about 50 per cent but on some services, the plane was full and EUjet was flying 2,000 passengers each weekend. "It's building nicely and traffic levels are about what we expected but it's early days," he added.

Michael O'Leary, the chief executive of Europe's biggest no-frills airline, Ryanair, has forecast a "bloodbath" this winter in the low-cost sector. But Mr McGoldrick, himself a former Ryanair chief executive in the early 1990s, said the sale to PlaneStation had secured EUjet's future while there was a market of 1.5 million people in its catchment area of Kent and no competition from other budget airlines.

up 1342% this morning

Consolidation of shares 1 for 15 old,in fact price declined

I know, price is down again then.

I do wish MoneyAm would compare the PTG-price-rise with the Consolidation - the sp has not "risen" by a huge amount, putting them in the leader-board.
The Consolidation is the reason. Division Ratio is 15.

Living in Devon I am extremely reluctant to go to Gat or HRow...this factor will work for others in Kent also which must mean EUjet has at least a fighting chance...as a shareholder would I recomend my best friend [anyone] to buy?...the ride is certainly unusual...now surely both will sink or swim together meantime the shares will not give much support to my bank account.

I hear that Exeter Airport is up for sale.

Perhaps PTG will buy it.

Only with another share issue and further dilution

Jeffmack
Whilst you may be right, KIA might be coining it in as a result of the EUjet flights. We'll just have to wait and see what the figures are. Unfortunately it will another couple of months before the CAA stats are released so unless PTG give some indication of throughput we are as mushrooms.

Spiral dive!! easy to correct but needs the necessary action, I think Mr May has taken PTG too close to the ground to pull out. Unless of course if lots of freight starts arriving through the BIP, If Liverpool Garden Site returns some realistic money, after all one and a half million is a laugh for that site even as a down payment and of course if EU jet achieves realistic load levels, 7 flights + taxes is not going to make a lot of profit (obviously just trying to fill seats, but if you need to sell seats at 7 not many passengers are paying an economical fare) IF, IF, IF. If only one IF were to be satisfied it would be some comfort to shareholders. I have lost confidence here and I am out.

Here I am in sunny Malaysia watching PTG dive. Never mind though PRE is compensating for me. Back in another week, look after PTG for me.

Al