Investment Company to Review MR Firms

British entrepreneur Ian Lancaster has launched Twenty, an investment vehicle looking to acquire companies in the marketing services sector, including MR and customer intelligence. Lancaster is known for setting up Virgin Cars for Richard Branson, and also helped found the IT consultancy Ultimate Perspective Group, sold in 2000 for £50m.

The target sector also includes the closely related fields of data acquisition, analytics and modelling as well as CRM, direct marketing and customer contact management. Twenty will look for companies with established track records, a stable client base, entrepreneurial management teams and synergistic opportunities for other group companies, initially focusing on the UK.

Alongside CEO Lancaster are three Non-executive Directors, Prof. Martin Clarke, Charles Perkins and Mark Patron. Patron founded Claritas UK and Abacus Europe, and also co-founded Claritas Europe. The Directors have between them invested £300,000 in the new company, which is expected to begin trading on 23rd June. Corporate advisors for the launch are St Helen's Capital Plc.

The market capitalisation following the placing, on the Ofex market, will be £1.7m - the AIM exchange having recently shut out shell companies seeking less than £3 million. The company expects to have funds of c.£440,000 for due diligence on suitable investment opportunities.

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All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.