Mirada losses mount as growing marketing spend bags clients
Audio-visual content group Mirada posted bigger half-year losses but its increased marketing spend throughout the period helped it secure several long-term revenue contracts and saw it shortlisted for several others.
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At the midway point of its trading year, Mirada had locked in a contract with ATN International to deploy its Iris product throughout the Caribbean and had also inked a deal that would see it provide the same software to Bolivian group Digital TV Cable Edmund.
However, the weakened Mexican economy led its biggest client, Televisa, to forward less money towards Mirada, leading to a decline in half-year revenues from $3.79m to $3.47m.
Losses before interest, tax, depreciated and amortisation for the six months leading to 30 September widened to $1.2m from the $80,000 a year earlier, mainly due to a heightened investment in sales, marketing and operational activities, Pre-tax losses grew from $1.7m to $2.92m.
Mirada's sales pipeline remained "healthy", with several open opportunities it had already been shortlisted for awaiting a final decision "in the upcoming months".
Net debt also increased, moving from $5.25m at the halfway point of 2016 to $7.57m twelve months later.
José Luis Vázquez, chief executive officer of Mirada, said, "Mirada has built a solid platform, which is highly valued by its customers. This, combined with the successful commercial roll-out of the Iris solution for Televisa last year, has enabled the company to build a solid sales pipeline, which has started bearing fruit with the signing of two significant new contracts."
“We are confident that we are just at the beginning of a new stage in which Mirada is successfully securing new business and ensuring long-term revenue visibility for its stakeholders," he added.
Earnings per share came in at $0.008, down from a flat 0.00p recorded at the same time a year before.
As of 1050 GMT, shares had declined 9.65% to 0.700p.