Lance Wiggs

We’ve just posted two new jobs for LWCM – one senior and one junior.

The Investment Manager role will be delegated significant responsibility, and the right person will eventually lead a team of people. We have a lot to do and this person will get it done. The person we hire could come from a wide variety of backgrounds – career switchers (e.g. from law, high growth companies, consulting) are welcome.

The Investment Analyst role is primarily about creating and curating powerful financial models, but also helping with everything else we do. Chris and I both have a solid history in creating big excel models, so the pressure is on.

In reality we are looking for great people – and will tailor the roles to suit.

These roles will be our first new hires, and will be significantly important to the future of Punakaiki Fund.  Let us know (lance@lwcm.co.nz) if you know anyone who could be suitable, or apply yourself either via email or through the Seek links above.

 

About LWCM

LWCM is the manager of Punakaiki Fund Limited, an investor in privately-held, high-growth New Zealand companies, currently with $37m of assets, 20 investments and 676 shareholders. Punakaiki Fund is the only VC fund open to retail (as well as wholesale/institutional) investors, and has grown from $1.5 million to $37 million in assets in just 4 years. We continue to to raise funds each year and are targeting $100 million and an IPO late in 2019. Our current investments include Coherent Solutions, Conqa, Melon Health, Weirdly, Raygun, Populate, Mobi2Go, Vend, Timely, Onceit and Devoli. Three of the companies qualify as Maori in business, seven have women founders or co-founders and ten have (or have had) founders with married or otherwise committed partners in the business.

LWCM was founded by Lance Wiggs and Chris Humphreys.

Lance was the sole advisor on the sale of Trade Me to Fairfax for $750 million in 2006. He has founded or co-founded several companies, advised hundreds of NZ companies on funding, growth, turnaround and exit – including over a hundred formally through NZTE’s Better by Capital and Better by Design programs. Lance has an MBA (Strategy, Finance) from Yale and a B Tech (Product Development) from Massey, and work experience including McKinsey & Co., BHP Billiton and EBRD. Lance is a director of eleven portfolio companies.

Chris is a CFA Charterholder, has two finance degrees (Otago and Canterbury) and a BSc, and was into heavy analytical work in his time at PwC Corporate Finance and Pacific Fibre. He grew up in the South Island and currently lives in Te Anau. Chris is a director of two portfolio companies.

Chris, Lance and LWCM have made 66 investments, with 25 made in the last year. LWCM runs two to four fundraising exercises for Punakaiki Fund each year, and has successfully completed four regulated retail offers.

With significant recent growth of Punakaiki Fund and more growth ahead LWCM has created two new roles to assist with the increased workload across a wide range of functions.

Investment Manager Role

The Investment Manager will take responsibility and accountability for increasing amounts of LWCM’s work, including sourcing, assessing, closing and advising portfolio companies, raising funds, PR and promotions and governance, compliance and administration.

Initially we expect a significant amount of time wil be spend on taking over and improving existing processes within LWCM and Punakaiki Fund. Beyond that the work will be varied and range up to potentially highly complex advisory tasks, financial modelling, negotiation and contract forming. The role will continue to evolve as LWCM hires more staff and Punakaiki Fund expands, moving to and beyond an IPO.

We also expect the Investment Manager will take on responsibility (through an investment allocation) for an initially small, but growing part of the assets under management. You will get hands-on experience, responsibility and accountability. 

Skills and experience

We are looking for great people who can bring some, but not necessarily all, of the following skills:

• Great comfort with excel and numerical analysis – preferably but not necessarily financial analysis (a CFA would be excellent). 
• Strong writing and research skills, including comfort with legal documents.
• Smart, inquisitive wide ranging perspectives on the world, industries and business models asked by strong analytical and strategic thinking.
• Ability to take responsibility – to lead, manage, self-organise, make decisions and deliver results individually and as part of or leading a team.
• A degree or post-graduate degree in an analytical field of study, along with an excellent academic record.  A CFA/CA/CAIA qualification and/or MBA (with finance concentration) from a top business school would be beneficial.
• Five or more years of demonstrated work experience in a related field. 

You may have experience in law, corporate finance, consulting, be from the high growth start-up sector, enterprise or the VC/PE sector. We are willing to contemplate a wide range of backgrounds and are looking for evidence that you are able to learn quickly to be able to help assist LWCM, Punakaiki Fund and companies we have invested into. 

 

Investment Analyst Role

The Investment Analyst will be actively involved with many areas of investing, portfolio management and Punakaiki Fund administration. The Investment Analyst is expected to add capacity to the existing LWCM team, and lead projects to deliver results across a wide range of areas. 

The Investment Analysts work will be centred around developing and maintaining financial models for existing and potential portfolio companies. These will be underpinned with researched assumptions and data, supported by dashboards and will help drive decisions and valuation recommendations for LWCM. You will also help monitor and support Punakaiki Fund portfolio companies, perform due diligence for potential new investments and draft, maintain and track investment cases. 

The Investment Analyst will also perform include high quality research, initiate and implement process improvements for the management of Punakaiki Fund and LWCM’s internal processes, and complete one-off task such as assisting with capital raising activities. You will also assist as Punakaiki Fund approaches its IPO in 2019.

We expect that the role will evolve over time as you gain experience and achieve results, with more time being spent assisting portfolio companies, financial reporting and investing with the prospect of responsibility (through an investment allocation) for an initially small, but growing part of the assets under management.

Skills and experience

We are looking for great people who can bring some, but not necessarily all, of the following skills:

• Great comfort with excel and financial analysis
• Strong writing and research skills, including comfort with legal documents.
• Smart, inquisitive wide ranging perspectives on the world, industries and business models asked by strong analytical and strategic thinking.
• Ability to self-organise, make decisions and deliver results.
• A degree or post-graduate degree in an analytical field of study, preferably finance along with an excellent academic record. You may have or be studying towards a CFA or similar. 
• At least two years of demonstrated work experience in a related, financial, field. 

You may have experience in corporate finance, consulting, accountancy or PE/VC, or have performed finance roles for the high growth start-up sector. 

The current Super Rugby NZ team names are appalling:

Crusaders: A name celebrating religion based genocide from centuries ago (Thanks to @sportsfreakconz for that definition)

Chiefs: White people’s interpretation of a Māori culture across the region. Perhaps next time we could actually ask local iwi what name they would like to choose.

Hurricanes: We don’t even have hurricanes in the Southern Hemisphere. Lazy.

 

Highlanders: Celebrates Scottish colonists – not exactly friendly to the tangata whenua.

Blues: It’s like they ran out of time – and then copied the South Africans.

It’s well beyond time for these to be renamed, using an inclusive process that considers local iwi, the players along with marketability.

John Hart has written a series of tweets about why a Blue Green coalition wold not work.

That saddens me. It’s the politics of can’t, or lack of hope. A smart party would be working all sides of a deal to find the bet path forward for their policies.

At stake is the rapid pace of Climate Crisis and of the adoption of electric vehicles, distributed power, batteries and so on. The Green party have been thinking about these issues for a long time and have a series of polices and people that will set our economy and society up to succeed in the times of turmoil ahead. It’s not time ti hiker down for another three years, but time to cut a deal, a good deal, with whatever party is going to be leading the new government.

At the moment the Greens have zero negotiating power – they have ceded it all to Labour by refusing to treat with National, and their members are not helping their own cause by reiterating the same. By painting themselves into this corner they will either end up in opposition again, with limited action on the causes that matter, or they will get what they are given in a red black and green coalition. Labour knows that the Green Party will join them in coalition no matter what, and can afford to offer a far better deal to NZ First.

But what if NZ Greens treated with National? They might be offered a better deal than from Labour and NZ First. That deal would change the brokers of this election from NZ First to NZ Greens, and then the negotiating could really get going.

Imagine a Greens deal for National that required:

1: Climate change as part of every cost benefit analysis/policy document, and a significantly boosted part of the Business Growth Agenda, with carbon emissions costed at $50 per tonne rising to $100 per tonne over 10 years. (This will drive transport and mining decisions)

2: $500 million per year allocated to cleaning up rivers, funded by a tax on farmers who are not abiding by a Sustainable Farming Code of Conduct. Fund decreases as farmers move into more compliance.

3: A falling cap on the amount of land used for cattle farming. Farmers will like it as their land will become more valuable.

4: $200 million per year into a series of linked habitats for native birds, and creation of 10km wide marine sanctuaries every 50  km of coast.

5: Julie-Ann Genter as Minister of Transport, James Shaw for Climate Change etc

6: Local bodies required to prepare for 1.9m sea rise from climate change, per the hidden report

7: Moratorium on any new mining or drilling operations, and increase of royalties of 4x.

8: Agreement to settle water rights with iwi and to allow each iwi/region to set a price for their water. Minimum price to apply.

9: Introduce a carbon tax at $5 per tonne, rising by $5 in the second year then $10 per tonne per year for 9 years. Charge it like GST with cascading carbon tax applying. No exceptions, including farming.

10: Use the proceeds of the carbon tax to invest in carbon reducing systems (public transport, lower methane emissions from belching cattle) and to subsidise entities who spend more money to lower carbon emissions.

11: Take 100,000 children out of poverty in 3 years, where poverty is defined as <definition> and annual targets are met or coalition fails.

I can imagine National negotiating and then agreeing to some, most or close to all of this. Some of it would be very tough, no doubt, but they have already agreed to 11, understand how to do 8 in a way that doesn’t destroy businesses and farms and are excellent at implementing big projects – this time public transport instead of roads. Some of the others are relatively cheap, and the biggest issue (and something worth fighting for) is the carbon tax, but if done well can be used to lower business and personal income tax – long a National goal.

That’s a Blue-Green Coalition. It aims to achieve goals for both parties. And a coalition like that would leave both parties stronger.

Why would Green Party members not support this? The answer is perhaps “because we don’t like National because of past behaviour” or “We don’t want to be crushed by being a coalition partner to National”

These are selfish motivations, and quite unlike the entire ethos that Green Party lives by. I’ve always seen the Green Party as a movement that is endeavouring to achieve certain environmental and societal goals, and they have welcomed it when other parties have adopted their policies. A coalition agreement like the above is one where they would achieve genuine lasting change could be put to members, and members strongly encouraged to vote.

Ideally another agreement with Labour and NZFirst would also be presented, and a genuine dilemma could emerge. What if they can achieve more with National than with Winston and Labour?

Real change happens when you move the normal – and there is no better way to change society to be Green than by moving National towards the solidity of long term green economics.

I had idly thought that Amazon’s RFP for  a second headquarters  location could be answered by Auckland. Sadly, albeit unsurprisingly, the request is for a North American location.

Perhaps we should still try –  after all the size of the prize is enormous:

Amazon is careful to show that they will create value well beyond that of the company’s investment in capital and salaries. Later on the expectation is that the winner will pay some of that benefit to Amazon.

The Case For Auckland

So while we are not in North America, its worth considering the RFP to see what sort of factors (“key preferences and decision drivers) a smart company like Amazon finds attractive, and whether or not Auckland is able to deliver. We should aim to be a city and country where we can host local or offshore companies that are as successful as Amazon.

Their overall preferences are for:

We can definitely tick those boxes here in Auckland, and I’d far rather live here than in any of the mooted locations in the US or Canada.

Site/Building

Amazon are looking for existing buildings, a greenfield site ready to go, or a combination. A greenfield site would need to be 100 acres. Wynyard Quarter in Auckland, for comparison, is 86 acres, not too dissimilar from the required size. It is in the middle of a transformation to mixed offices and residential, with most of the industrial operations being moved out.

While Amazon are happy with a site within 30 minutes of downtown, there is at least one other site nearby that could be interesting, as highlighted below. While fans of ports and golf courses would not agree, it’s worthwhile comparing, if academically only, the value created by each versus that touted by Amazon.

There is also the city itself – with a lot more densification possible downtown by building several courageously large towers.

Amazon’s location does not have to be downtown – merely within 30 minutes of the city and 45 minutes to the airport. But they also want their own train station, as well as access to other forms of public transport.

As it happens the port location would probably best deliver on access to mass transit, showing the value of that space. Leaving that red herring aside the CRL project will put stations within reach of most downtown locations. There are also plans for light rail to and beyond Wynyard Quarter, which would begin to be great if it also went across the harbour to the North Shore.

If we can provide mass transit so that the airport is 30 minutes away from the city (as it is now by car at most times) then a lot more possibilities would open up. I have probably highlighted some areas that are absolutely not available, but the point is that there is a lot of land out there.

 

There is plenty of public transport and liveability momentum, plans and ideas, and there seems to be enough space in Auckland. However Auckland is not yet able to credibly provide the combination of land and high quality public transport for a firm like Amazon. The implications are that we should continue to build our public transport and keep thinking about the value of the port space (and the cost of alternatives).

Amazon invests heavily in sustainable buildings and renewable power. New Zealand does provide a very high percentage of renewable power from the grid, but, despite an excellent power framework, has some progress to make when it comes to managing private power supplies.

Capital and Operating Costs

While it may be hard for a NZ government to match US cities with incentives there is no arguing that our tax system is simple, and our business environment is very stable and amongst the world’s best.

Incentives

Incentives are so important that Amazon put them twice in the list. Again I can’t really see an NZ government falling over backwards in today’s economic or political environment. The scale of the deal is a bit too large, we fundamentally believe in fairness and finding jobs for high tech workers is the least of our problems.

Labour Force

Auckland gets a tick here, with 3 top universities present and as destination for graduates from every university in New Zealand. The jobs will be highly paid, so accomodation won’t be so much of an issue. The downside is that rents and house values would go even higher and the burden on those who cannot it.

Logistics

Amazon wants direct flights to Seattle, San Francisco as well as NYC and Washington DC. We can provide the first two at least, though they would be shocked at their down time between cities. Out national airline has requested Boeing, a company that decamped from Seattle for Chicago in 2001, and Airbus to develop planes that can fly directly to the other two cities. That might take some time.

Amazon also want access to local highways to access other North American Amazon locations. We might suffer a bit on that paramter.

Time to Operations

Amazon wants to get going quickly. Auckland has almost twenty cranes at the moment, and while we can probably expedite some of our regulations there should be no real barrier to a new build. Some US cities though would have large free spaces, for example Detroit with the remnants of the crippled motor vehicle industry.

The work by Panuku and private developers in Wynyard and Britomart, along with the CRL and bike lanes show that Auckland can think big, although perhaps Amazon scale would be a level up again.

Cultural Community Fit

New Zealand is commonly in the top ranks of places to live, and for good reason. We have a very diverse population, the world’s best relationship between a country and its indigenous people and many efforts to bridge across cultures. We will always have more to do, but we crush the USA on this measure – not least because our police don’t shoot people.

A stable business climate is critical to New Zealand, and we have been one of the top few easiest places to do business or many years. Meanwhile our local and national government systems make the USA’s look both corrupt and Byzantine.

Community/Quality of Life

This is our greatest strength, where we take the ability to go to the coast, breathe fresh air and drink fresh water for granted. In Auckland we have a Council that, thanks to the Super City, is delivering strongly to increase liveability and workability.

Yes we can argue that we have taken things a bit too much for granted when it comes to water, and there are people living on the streets which is unacceptable. But without getting too political there is cross-party support, and very strong efforts by some, to solve these issues.

Other factors

Fibre

The UFB program is something the National government got absolutely right over there last 9 years, and we are blessed with fibre to the business and to many homes. However Amazon would need to buy a lot of capacity on existing sub sea cables, or probably even build their own.

Climate Change

Sadly for the Port and Wynyard Quarter options the viability of those spaces is relatively limited over the next 50 years. With the current emissions on track to, as Schroders Bank reported, hit a 4.1 degrees rise by 2050, that land will be come unuseable, and certainly unsuitable for intensive development.  Perhaps that’s why the report stating that Councils should be assuming 1.9 meters for sea level rise was buried by the government earlier this year. Wynyard Quarter, as reclaimed land, is just 1.3 meters above high tide level.

 

Overall

It’s a short document, but we can all learn from Amazon’s perspective, kickbacks aside, of what makes a great place to live and work. Auckland stands ready, distant location and lack of a decent train system aside, to offer Amazon a new home.

 

The Taxpayers Union is a lobby group who, seemingly, would like to get rid of all tax. Insider Dave Farrar covered their latest attack on tax, which is on rates in Auckland.

It’s ridiculous. We actually have a great deal here and we have the opportunity to invest a lot more into making Auckland even better.

So let’s walk through the basics about rates, a tax that we use to fund councils to provide transport, infrastructure and all sorts of other services. Rates that are paid by Auckland ratepayers will substitute somewhat for tax paid to the national government, which needs to invest back into Auckland. So higher rates for Aucklanders should lower Wellington resident Dave Farrar’s own taxes, so I’m sure he will be a fan.

Firstly 34% of people and 32% of ratepayers live in Auckland, and 50% in Auckland, Christchurch, Wellington and Hamilton. So when it comes to ratepayers the cities matter. Auckland is growing very quickly, and has a legacy of underinvestment to catch up on. We need to spend a lot more than we are getting.

Number of Ratepayers by Region

The average rates paid per home vary by district. There seems to be no pattern between the size of a population and the average rates paid. The chart below is sorted, again, by population.

Rates paid per home

However we see that Auckland and Queenstown Lakes average house prices are well above the rest, while in general the cities have higher average house prices prices than the smaller rural areas.

Average Home Price

But the cities seem to pay lower rates as a percentage of their home value, and Auckland in particular looks suspiciously low.

Annual Rates Paid/Average Home price (July 2017)

Auckland has the lowest rates in New Zealand

Sorting the list by Rates Paid/Average Price shows that Auckland is offering the lowest rates in the country, at just 0.22% of the average house price per year.

That’s almost 30% less than the 0.31% fees lowest cost Kiwisaver provider Simplicity charges to invest your money and over 75% cheaper than Fisher Funds charges for their more traditional (expensive) Kiwisaver plan.

Think about it – it costs less to provide all the infrastructure for a home owning ratepayer’s Auckland needs than it does to manage the cheapest Kiwisaver plan. It costs less to provide all those services – while that housing investment is growing in tax-free value. It’s an absurdly great deal for the ratepayer.

No wonder so many people want to live here.

Annual Rates Paid/Average Home price (July 2017)

Plenty of room to rise

The average rate payer in New Zealand pays just 0.35% of their house value each year, still far less than most Kiwisaver providers.

If we had a single nation-wide standard rates fee as a percentage of home value then we would have a national rate of 0.35% of home value. That would mean rates in Auckland would rise by 50%, in Queenstown Lakes by 29% and everywhere else the rates would fall.

So here in Auckland we underpay our rates, and the national government has to subsidise (and they don’t enough) our infrastructure more than they should. they certainly pay their way in Waitomo –  if Aucklanders paid as much as they did there then rates would rise by 550%.

A 50% rate rise in Auckland is entirely justifiable, and the rest of New Zealand should be demanding we pay our fair share, and lowering their rates too. But can Aucklanders afford to pay more?

Yes, yes we can.

Over just the last year homeowners have, almost everywhere, made substantial capital gains and once again Auckland’s did very well.

Let’s compare those tax-free capital gains last year with the actual rates paid last year. The capital gains are the long orange lines below, and the rates are the barely visible blue lines. Remember this is just last year – Aucklanders have enjoyed a sustained period of growth in property values.

Average Capital Gain/home in 12 months to July 2017 versus average rates paid

Last year alone Auckland ratepayers averaged a tax free gain of $52,000 from each property, and they paid an average of just $2,340 in rates. The gain is 2226% greater than the cost, a ratio any Kiwisaver fund would be proud to brag about.

We all need to stop complaining our rates, especially those who can afford to pay them with cash, and who are sitting on vast windfall gains.

If you can’t afford to pay then check out the programs that Auckland Council has for low income households. Or talk to your bank about how to cash in on your windfall gains.

So let’s start talking about the great deal we have in Auckland, and our capacity to increase rates. Let’s start thinking instead about how we can accelerate some of the transformational progress that has been made already.

 

Sources:
I copied some data from the Taxpayers Union microsite [they want your details], and added the July 2017 data from the QV Residential House Values page for July 2017. I removed Kaipara and Waimakariri (1.6% of population) from some of the data as they did not have compete stats. All mistakes mine. 

We released the Punakaiki Fund 2017 Annual Report last week.

The assets have grown from $1.5 million in April 2014 to $28.4 million at the end of March 2017, with the iNAV/Share rising from $10 to $20.10 in the same period. The iNAV is the “investor net asset value per share” and not a GAAP measure. We see it as the most pertinent measure to use as it is the measure that relates to the share price.

That’s a good, if realised, return for our investors. Our internal calculations show a 45% IRR based on the unrealised investment value increase, driven mainly by companies we invested in two or three years ago.

We now have have investments in 19 companies, in seed, very high growth and more mature growth stages (e.g. over $10 million revenue), with most of the value split between the latter two. The smaller ones grew by over 600% (on average) over two years, while the medium ones were over 400% and the large ones over 130%.

We continue our focus on placing most almost all funds with companies that have growing revenue, with the combined FY2017 revenue estimated at $69.5 million in the annual report. We closely monitor financial sustainability, aiming aim to invest into companies that can maintain their viability without raising further funds, and almost all of he investment value is in that category.

As always our principal issue is raising enough funding to place with the companies. We do run periodic offers so get in touch if you are a wholesale investor (e.g. over $100,000 to invest) or any potential investor can sign up to the mailing list from Punakaiki Fund.

We keep our frugal approach to using investor funds during the year, and our net cash used in operating activities was just 1.7% of assets. Compare this to other funds that invest in (and are active directors of) private companies. Moreover we do not take money from the companies themselves – other than reimbursement for travel.

This chart from the Household Incomes Report is worth deeper inspection.

Each row adds up to 100%, so, for example, 12% of people 0-17 are in the top quintile (top 20%) of households by income.

 

I want to call out three findings:

Maori and Pacific Island households are much less likely to be wealthy, and likely to be poor. We need to do better.

25% of European/Pakeha households are in the top 20% of earners, but only 9% of Maori and 6% of Pacific Islanders are in the top 20% of earners. 33% of Maori and 35% of Pacific Island households are in the bottom 20% of earners.

That’s a systematic gap that percolates throughout society, and we need to fix it.

Old people are poor (in income), but well looked after.

35% of households with 65 year olds earn in the bottom 20% of household incomes and just over half of all 65+ year olds living alone have income in the bottom 20%.

Our society has delivered to these people with a guaranteed basic income (superannuation), free health care and free public transport travel.

Single parents are poor, but not so well looked after.

50% of single parents are in the bottom 20% of household incomes.

We have not provided these parents with a no-strings guaranteed basic income nor with free public transport.

They have more expenses than old people (aside from health care) and making sure their kids are raised in a secure environment has large and positive future impacts on society. We can do better.

 

New Zealand is proving to be a popular place to live, as witnessed by the increase in net arrivals.

More people are arriving and fewer people are leaving.

We have our issues, but it’s nice to reflect now and then that yes, we do truly live in a place where people want to live.

I’m reminded of that each day as I look out the window at work at the crowds of happy tourists visiting Auckland’s Art Gallery, or as I wander through the streets of downtown Auckland, Britomart, the Viaduct and Wynyard Quarter.

I’m reminded each time I fly to another city in New Zealand – on average one a week – and feel blessed not just for the wonderful destination and people, but also for the simplicity of the journey on our national airline.

I’m reminded whenever I listen to the National Program from RNZ, and compare and contrast with any media outlet offshore.

I’m reminded when I experience our healthcare system, our natural abundance, and, even, our taxation and welfare system.

We are a beacon of political sensibility in a world increasingly pressured by political turmoil.

We are a society that has deliberately worked hard at fixing underlying issues caused years of institutionalised discrimination, recognising the central role of the Tangata Whenua in New Zealand,  working through treaty settlements and along the way realising and promoting a true multi-cultural society. We welcome all people.

We are consistently ranked as one of the best places in the world to do business – and it’s increasingly clear to me that this is based on fact.

We are the lucky country – lucky because we have worked hard at being a great place to live.

 

Locals and people from offshore are voting with their feet. Right now it’s a great time to be in New Zealand. Join in and help us get even better.

A press release from Punakaiki Fund. Punakaiki Fund Limited is raising capital through a Product Disclosure Statement (PDS). Investors may apply at Punakaikifund.co.nz/InvestNow or via Snowball Effect.

PRESS RELEASE

19 December 2016

Punakaiki Fund Exceeds Expectations from 2015 Crowdfunding Offer and makes Three New Investments.

Punakaiki Fund has exceeded its Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) set as part of the June 2015 crowdfunding offer on Snowball Effect’s platform.

Punakaiki Fund manager Lance Wiggs says each of the KPIs were not just met but exceeded.

“Our Net Asset Value per share rose by over 26% in the 12 months after the offer, while in 2015 we appointed three new directors to the Punakaiki Fund board,” he says.

The results come after a strong year from the portfolio of 18 companies. “We invest in growth, and the hard work from the hundreds of people at these high growth  companies is paying off” says Wiggs.

Punakaiki Fund also announces three new investments into existing portfolio companies.

The first, increasing the shareholding of school firewall providers Linewize (LINK), was signalled in the Product Disclosure Statement and lifts Punakaiki Fund’s shareholding to 20%. Linewize CEO Scott Noakes says he is very pleased with the investment and says, “We are expecting continued strong growth in New Zealand over the next 12 months and have also launched our partnership with Hapara in the USA, with a team visiting our first installations this month.”

The second investment leads a small internal investment round with Mobi2Go, and lifts Punakaiki Fund’s shareholding from 11.0% to 12.6%.

CEO and Founder Tarik Malett thanked Punakaiki Fund and says, “The funds are primarily being used to support our expansion and we are focused on new opportunities with large franchises including fuel stations and restaurant chains. Meanwhile our development team isn’t standing still, recently optimising our core code to run 50% faster, reducing our infrastructure costs by 25% and delivering a noticeable speed increase to customers.”

The third committed investment is the early exercise of half of the options held with NZ Artesian Water, raising Punakaiki Fund’s shareholding from 11.8% to 16.1%. Founder and CEO Andrew Strang says, “We are overwhelmed with demand from several very large global customers for our E’Stel bottled water, and are using these funds to buy new plant to expand our capacity.”

NZ Artesian Water’s Nelson plant was opened by Prime Minister John Key in March 2015 and is already showing signs of strong growth.

“We just had our biggest month of sales ever – more than double our next biggest month, and we are aiming to increase monthly sales by over five times over the next six to eight months. We need to invest in our plant so that we can keep up with demand,” says Strang.

Punakaiki Fund has received investor commitments for $1.8 million so far in the current public offer, which closes on Tuesday 20^th December.

Wiggs says, “These new investments show the demand for our funds from great companies. Each of them is growing their revenue at a very high rate, and these and others would benefit from even more funding to accelerate that growth.”

<end>

 

NOTES

KPI 1: Net Asset Value per Share rises by over 20% in 12 months

The Net Asset Value per Share, as defined during the 2015 crowdfunding offer, rose by 26.4% in the 12 months from the offer closing on July 1 2015 to June 30, 2016.

The closing date of the crowdfunding round was 1 July 2015, but some shares from the three offers at the time were only issued during the month of July. This analysis uses pro forma accounts as at 1 July 2015 as if all shares were issued and all capital raised had been received.

Punakaiki Fund Limited completed a full valuation exercise as part of the preparation for the current offer to the public in September 2016, and the result (the Net Asset Value rising by 34.8% over 15 months) represents a similar percentage increase on an annualised basis.

Punakaiki Fund has subsequently refined the definition of Net Asset Value for communication with investors. They now use the term Investor Net Asset Value (iNAV) to refer to the key benchmark that investors should track, as it also accounts for the equity portion of Punakaiki Fund’s manager’s accrued performance fee. Using this investor rather than accounting-centric measure shows slightly lower returns of around 25% in the 12 months after the crowdfunding raise.

The price for the 2016 offer was $14.50 per share and the current public offer is priced at $19.00 per share. These prices include brokerage of 3%.

	July 1 2015 Pro Forma	June 30 2016	Sep 30 2016	Current Offer
NAV	$10,708,589	$18,112,940	$19,320,663	$19,940,803
iNAV	$10,351,250	$17,307,152	$18,330,646	$18,936,819
NAV/Share	$14.31	$18.09	$19.29	$19.37
iNAV/Share	$13.83	$17.28	$18.30	$18.40
NAV/Share increase		26.4%	34.8%	35.4%
iNAV/Share increase		24.9%	32.3%	33.0%
Shares on issue	748,331	1,001,466	1,001,466	1,029,286

Summary table of changes in NAV and iNAV.

KPI 2: Present an independent director to the shareholders for vote within three months

Punakaiki Fund presented three directors to shareholders for shareholder vote within three months of the Snowball Effect Offer at Punakaiki Fund’s 2015 Annual Meeting. These candidates, Mike Bennetts (Z Energy CEO), John Berry (Pathfinder Asset Management) and Bryan Hutchins (Real Journeys), were selected after a call for nominations from shareholders.

All were voted in with overwhelming majorities at the 2015 Annual Meeting.

Lance Wiggs says, “Frankly we were overwhelmed when the three candidates offered their help, and have been delighted with the board’s support to date. They are doing a great job for shareholders.”

At the September 2016 Annual Meeting, Punakaiki Fund’s shareholders voted Mandy Simpson (CEO Cyber Toa, ex COO NZX) to be added to the board of directors, and Wiggs now considers that Punakaiki Fund has a highly experienced and well balanced board, especially considering the size of the company.

Lance Wiggs says, “The board works hard to protect shareholder interests, and we focus on risk management, valuation and Punakaiki Fund’s path to IPO.”

Punakaiki Fund more recently designated Bryan Hutchins as a non-independent director as interests associated with him held over 5% of the shares on issue prior to the latest offer.

More information

Lance Wiggs
021 526239
lance@punakaikifund.co.nz

Punakaiki Fund Limited is raising capital through a Product Disclosure Statement (PDS).

The Governance section of the Punakaiki Fund website has background documents on Punakaiki Fund as well as bios for the directors.

Punakaiki Fund Limited is raising capital through a Product Disclosure Statement (PDS).

You can apply for shares Online with Punakaiki Fund, via Snowball Effect or by filling out and sending in the application form on the PDS.

 

We have kept relatively quiet at Punakaiki Fund while everyone has coped with the US election result and then the huge earthquake and aftershocks. It didn’t help that Ireland toppled the All Blacks – although that at least was well deserved.

Our offer was meant to close today Wednesday 30th November, but due to the events above we have just extended this to 20th December, 2016.

We will issuing shares soon to those who have invested already, and will be sharing news on any new investment commitments we make.

We currently have $1.44 million in applications, with $640,000 of that via  Snowball Effect and the remainder directly with Punakaiki Fund.

Anyone in New Zealand can invest. Australian wholesale investors can use the Australian Investment Memorandum aimed at them. Investors based elsewhere should get in touch directly.

 

Update about the earthquake

We have investments with several companies which have offices in Wellington and Christchurch, or with staff in those areas. All staff are safe. Some families were temporarily evacuated from low-lying areas during the tsunami threat, and several were unable to access their Wellington offices for a day or two.

The good news was that almost all of the Wellington based companies had prioritised offices with high earthquake ratings, and several had recently moved for that reason. The other company was about to move offices anyway. For us this was more evidence of why we like to invest with good people with strong values.

Meanwhile most companies were able to keep working – as remote working is now a part of doing business. The Christchurch, and Wellington, earthquakes over the last few years have nudged New Zealand based companies to be very proactive on handling things after a disaster and that preparation was evident.

I’ve visited both Wellington (twice) and Christchurch since the quakes. Christchurch seems largely unaffected, while Wellington’s infrastructure has certainly suffered and there are some frayed nerves. However life goes on, and it was good to see evidence in Wellington of the staunch just-get-on-with-it attitude that has served Christchurch so well.

Our continued best wishes to everyone in Wellington, Christchurch, Kaikoura and places in between.

Revenue Growth Continues

Almost all of the investments (i.e. the underlying businesses) are unaffected – with revenues mainly from offshore or with clients able to cope. One company, NZ Artesian Water, saw sales go up sharply, as they supplied increased demand from supermarkets in the South Island and even farmers in the Kaikoura region.  Others have continued to land important deals, with Melon Health in particular securing some strong clients.

Invest in Punakaiki Fund

Now that the dust has settled, the All Blacks and Black Caps are winning matches and the weather has improved it’s perhaps time to consider investing in the future of NZ – our high growth ecosystem. Please have a look at the PDS, and do consider joining the over 500 others who have already invested in this and previous rounds.

You can apply for shares Online with Punakaiki Fund, via Snowball Effect or by filling out and sending in the application form on the PDS.