WANdisco hopes rebrand will change fortunes after a "traumatic" first half

Shares in WANdisco dropped on Monday morning after the struggling data activation platform confirmed first-half bookings had slumped following a "traumatic time" for the company.

The company, which helps companies to move large volumes of unstructured data on to the cloud, said it is now "setting a path to business as usual" as it recovers from sales irregularities last year linked to one senior sales employee, which had resulted in estimated 2022 revenues being artificially inflated by over 200%.

Shares were suspended from trade back in March after the delay in publishing its 2022 results as the company conducted an investigation and worked with the Financial Conduct Authority. The investigation led to the resignation of its founder and chief executive David Richards and chief financial officer Erik Miller, along with a number of non-executive directors.

WANdisco, which will soon change its name to Cirata as it hopes to re-invent its image, labelled 2023 as a "transitional year" as it attempts to bounce back, both commercially and reputationally.

"As a consequence of the disruption, normal commercial activities with our partners and direct clients were severely impacted and paused," explained chief executive Stephen Kelly. "This, together with the necessary steps taken to align costs in the business and to requalify the existing pipeline, has had the effect of reducing pipeline cover and extending sales cycles. In short, H1 2023 was poor for both bookings and revenue."

The company announced that revenues for the six months to 30 June were just $3m, down from $5.8m the year before, as bookings had slumped to $2.8 from $7.3m. The adjusted EBITDA loss was $14.8m compared with a loss of $14.1m the year before.

The company, which recently raised $30m in equity fundraising, ended the first half with just $3.2m in cash, down from $19.1m at the start of the year.

Looking ahead, bookings are expected to be around $4.3m-6m in the second half.

The stock was down 5.3% at 62.7p by 0850 on Monday, taking its year-to-date loss to 93%.