Canadian owner of RedSky IT reports pre-tax loss of £3.3m
16:02 13 Jan 2009
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Explorer Group
The group has two subsidiaries:
- RedSky IT (Hemel) – its construction-facing division
- RedSky IT (Crick) – a smaller operation offering accounting IT to architects
The latest results, covering an eight month period only to 31 July 2007, are somewhat dated as the period ended more than 17 months ago.
Mike Aspinwall, managing director, explained that the actual trading period covered only six of the eight months.
Explorer, which bought RedSky in January 2007, operates with just one director – Canadian Jim McFarlane who started the IT software business 12 years ago.
Redsky’s previous venture capital backers had been looking for an exit for 12 months when McFarlane stepped forward. He was a contractor prior to his switch into IT.
Explorer arrived with plans to sweep in its existing Canadian-style format of operating whereby everyone worked from home in a “virtual-type” operation. Some Canadian employees were reported to use their garage as their work-base.
In his latest director’s report for Explorer Group
“The resulting reduction in overheads will allow the business to increase margins while contributing positively to staff’s quality of life.”
RedSky IT is mainly used in construction for accounting, payroll and procurement systems, says the group.
The list of costs that contributed to the company running into the red included:
- £2.7m of redundancy and reorganisation costs
- £470,000 for the amortisation of goodwill
- £830,000 for research and development
Of the 133 employees, 112 were involved in programming and engineering. The total bill for wages and salaries ran to £2.4m for the six trading months covered.
The ultimate parent company is Explorer Holdings Inc, a company incorporated in