Up to 150 angry creditors, said to be jointly owed about $15 million, are expected to head for Deloitte’s Parramatta, Sydney, office on Thursday for the first creditors meeting for two subsidiaries of Gold Coast-based streaming service Guvera that have been placed in administration.
They are expected to include some of the 3000-plus investors who pumped money into Guvera as clients of accountants signed up to AMMA Private Equity network, an outfit connected with Guvera co-founder Darren Herft.
Thursday’s meeting comes on the heel of last week’s dramatic refusal by the Australian Securities Commission to approve Guvera’s planned sharemarket float, under which the Queensland outfit hoped to raise as much as $300 million – and reward founders Herft and Claes Loberg with shareholdings possibly worth as much as $98 million and $144 million respectively.
Deloitte partner Neil Cussen has said about 60 of the 150 creditors of the two subsidiaries involved in Thursday’ meeting are staff who are owed entitlements. The other 90 include the Australian Taxation Office.
Meanwhile parent company Guvera is aiming to reduce its monthly cash burn from $5-6 million to about $1.6 million. It’s said to be planning to cut about 60 staff.
Cussen said Guvera is working on a possible deed of company arrangement which could prevent the subsidiaries from being wound up, at least for the moment, though he didn’t expect that to be finalised for seven to 10 days – after Tuesday’s meeting.
