Tech company raises $25.8m to pay off debt

Gentrack Group said it raised about $25.8 million in a stock offer to retail investors, in the second part of a twostage share sale aimed at raising funds to repay debt used for a recent flurry of acquisitions.

Total take-up under the retail entitlement offer, which closed on July 26, was 68 per cent, Aucklandbased Gentrack said in a statement.

The company is now offering a retail shortfall bookbuild for 1.93 million entitlements, being run from yesterday.

The previous institutional entitlement offer, which was run earlier this month, raised about $31.5m.

Its shortfall bookbuild of 3.4 million entitlements achieved a clearing price of $6.69 per share, a premium of 50 cents per share over the offer price of $6.19 and a discount of 19 cents per share to the theoretical exrights price of $6.88.

The $90m capital raise is fully underwritten by Deutsche Craigs and UBS New Zealand.

The funds raised will go towards repaying bank debt taken on after a series of four acquisitions totalling $138m before earn-out payments, which the utilities software developer says will leave it with almost no bank debt and give it a strong enough balance sheet to make more acquisitions.

In June, Gentrack bought UKbased energy data analysis software and services provider Evolve Analytics for an enterprise value of $44m, adding to last year’s acquisition of UK billing and customer information systems firm Junifer Systems for $74.6m and European airport software developers Blip Systems and CA Plus for about $20.3m.

The shares last traded at $6.89, and have risen 4 per cent this year.

The stock is rated an average “hold” based on three analyst recommendations compiled by Reuters, with a median target price of $6.69.