[Melbourne, AUSTRALIA] In Tuesday’s choppy waters Australian listed technology investor Senetas (ASX:SEN) held firm after announcing a US $2 million investment in U.S.-based global positioning systems player Axiom Navigation Inc.
Founded in 1996, Axiom expects more than US $7 million revenues for 2000. A backlog of orders for its patent pending GPS technology should maintain revenue growth and profits in the short-term, according to Senetas.
Axiom is also set to profit from the U.S. government’s e-911 mandate requiring all mobile phones in the United States to be fitted with a GPS location device by October 2001. Motorola
(NYSE:MOT) and Nokia
(NASDAQ:NOK)
chose Axiom as the integrator of GPS technology for their mobile phone products.
The US $2 million will not initially be for direct equity in Axiom, it will be for a Convertible Unsecured Promissory Note over 8 percent of the company. The Note can be converted to common stock at a 40 percent discount to the price of Axiom’s next capital raising, tentatively scheduled for December.
Senetas’ investment entitles it to appoint one director on the Axiom board.
Senetas CFO John Robertson said of the circumstances leading to the firm’s most recent investment, “The objective of setting up the office in LA was to use it as a conduit for other investments.”
Robertson said Senetas has been networking hard and the Axiom deal was directly attributable to the firm’s commitment to doing business in the U.S. Senetas hopes its Singapore office will also act as a conduit for further investments.
