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Research: Consumer
Evolva has announced changes to its Board of Directors at its upcoming AGM. Richard Ridinger, who joined the board two years ago, is not standing for re-election given his other commitments, but will continue to support Evolva in an advisory role. Two new members are being proposed, bringing the total number of board members to five and broadening the board’s experience. Evolva is also proposing to increase the existing conditional and authorised share capital to allow for strategic and financial flexibility, as well as strengthening its corporate governance and shareholder rights. There has been substantial management change at Evolva over the past few years as it moves to a product-based revenue model. The AGM proposals demonstrate that the new CEO, Christian Wichert, wishes to be more shareholder friendly as he continues to move Evolva towards break-even and profitability.
Written by
Evolva |
Shareholder-friendly AGM proposals |
AGM statement |
Consumer |
24 March 2022 |
Share price performance
Business description
Analysts
Evolva is a research client of Edison Investment Research Limited |
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Evolva has announced changes to its Board of Directors at its upcoming AGM. Richard Ridinger, who joined the board two years ago, is not standing for re-election given his other commitments, but will continue to support Evolva in an advisory role. Two new members are being proposed, bringing the total number of board members to five and broadening the board’s experience. Evolva is also proposing to increase the existing conditional and authorised share capital to allow for strategic and financial flexibility, as well as strengthening its corporate governance and shareholder rights. There has been substantial management change at Evolva over the past few years as it moves to a product-based revenue model. The AGM proposals demonstrate that the new CEO, Christian Wichert, wishes to be more shareholder friendly as he continues to move Evolva towards break-even and profitability.
Year end |
Revenue (CHFm) |
PBT* |
EPS* |
DPS |
P/E |
Yield |
12/20 |
7.5 |
(23.4) |
(2.9) |
0.0 |
N/A |
N/A |
12/21 |
9.9 |
(24.5) |
(2.6) |
0.0 |
N/A |
N/A |
12/22e |
14.9 |
(13.5) |
(1.3) |
0.0 |
N/A |
N/A |
12/23e |
23.4 |
(8.6) |
(0.8) |
0.0 |
N/A |
N/A |
Note: *PBT and EPS are normalised, excluding amortisation of acquired intangibles, exceptional items and share-based payments.
In line with Christian Wichert’s comments at the time of the FY21 results, the culture will be changed to be more entrepreneurial and agile but will require ‘all hands on deck’. As a result, Richard Ridinger has decided not to stand for re-election at the AGM as Evolva’s next phase of development will demand even more time from board members and he has other commitments. Andreas Pfluger is standing for election to the board. He has broad international experience, most recently as CEO North America at Lindt & Sprüngli until 2019. Andreas Weigelt is also standing for election as board representative of Veraison, the shareholder which acquired a 6.2% shareholding in Evolva in November 2021.
To improve corporate governance and strengthen shareholder rights, the Board of Directors is proposing to lower the thresholds for convening general meetings from 10% to 5% and for including items on the agenda to 0.5%. In addition, the deadline for adding items to the agenda will be shortened from 45 to 35 days before the AGM.
As a reminder, at the FY21 results Evolva confirmed that FY22 will continue the trend started in Q4 and the gross contribution will be positive, which will be a key step towards eventually achieving positive operating and net profit. The new CEO will revise the strategy and mid-term targets by the H1 results in August. The guidance of reaching cash break-even by end FY23 has notably been dropped for now.
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Research: Financials
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