BVI Company News

Last week, oil and natural gas company Transmeridian Exploration Inc. announced that its board of directors has made some arrangements to complete the proposed acquisition of the company by its BVI-registered subsidiary Trans Meridian International, Inc. (TMI).

Some months ago, Transmeridian Exploration Inc. entered into a definitive merger agreement with TMI pursuant to which the BVI company will make a tender offer of $3 per share, to purchase all of company’s outstanding shares of common stock. One of the milestones towards the completion of the proposed financing arrangements relates to detailed information that was required to be provided by Transmeridian Exploration Inc. until March 21, 2008. In connection to this, Transmeridian’s directors board informed its BVI-registered subsidiary that, if it is not satisfied with such information, or if the financing condition contained in the definitive merger agreement between the company and TMI has not been satisified by March 31, 2008, the company will terminate the definitive merger agreement.

Transmeridian is continuing discussions on the potential acquisition of the company with another interested party, but if it does not enter into agreement with another company, its stockholders may receive less than the $3.00 per share contained in the current agreement with TMI.

The Anglo-Russian developer of mineral resources AM Aricom Plc announced that it has purchased options to buy two further licences that will expand significantly the existing Aricom projects K&S and Garinskoye - the Garinskoye Flanks license and the Kostenginskoye license. Aricom’s unit has already made two cash payments of US$22.5 mln for granting the options.

The Garinskoye Flanks license is owned by a Cypriot company Guiner Enterprises Ltd, which is owned by two British Virgin Islands companies – Myrtle Corp. Ltd and Ardoryna Commercial Ltd. The shareholders of Guiner Enterprises have conditionally agreed to sell their shares in Cypriot company to Aricom.  Aricom’s wholly owned subsidiary Aricom UK Ltd. has signed option agreements to acquire the indirect holders of the two licenses. Both assets are US$80 mln, comprising US$40 mln for each asset.

The Garinskoye Flanks deposit covers an area of 3,530 km surrounding Aricom’s currently owned Garinskoye license, and is estimated to contain nearly 1 billion tonnes of reserves and resources. The area of the Kostenginskoye iron ore deposit is about 24 km.

It is reported from Tortola, BVI, that the media consulting company Clek Media Inc. has brokered the world-record sale of the domain  FUND.COM. The domain was sold in an all-cash transaction for US$9,999,950. Clek represented the seller of the domain, assisting in both the negotiation and closing of the transaction. The buyer is Fund.com Inc., a New York company formerly known as Meade Technologies Inc.

It is claimed by Clek that the nearly $10 mln purchase price for FUND.COM represents the highest price ever paid for an Internet domain. It is known that in July 2007 developed BUSINESS.COM portal was sold to yellow pages publisher, RH Donnelly, for $345 million, which is 47 times the purchase price $7.5 mln of the domain name acquired 8 years ago.

Clek Media Inc. is a digital media consulting company that specializes in helping companies develop intellectual property in the digital space. Its consultants work with top management to find new and better ways to make money in this rapidly growing area.

San Diego-registered Iomega Corporation, which is a worldwide leader in innovative storage and network security solutions for small and mid-sized businesses, consumers and others, has announced that it has received an unsolicited non-binding indication of interest from EMC Corporation. In this indication, EMC said that it is ready to offer to acquire the outstanding common stock of Iomega for $3.25 per share, assuming a total of approximately 54.8 mln outstanding shares.

Iomega’s board of directors decided however that EMC’s proposal would not reasonably constitute a superior proposal, within the meaning of the share purchase agreement between the selling stockholders Iomega, Cayman Islands-based ExcelStor Great Wall Technology Limited and ExcelStor Holdings Limited, Chinese companies Shenzhen ExcelStor Technology Limited  and Great Wall Technology Company Limited, and British Virgin Islands-based ExcelStor Holdings Limited.

Iomega and the selling stockholders including the above-named BVI company executed a share purchase agreement in December 2007, in connection with a business combination. Now, Iomega and the selling stockholders are preparing the required filings for obtaining the necessary regulatory and stockholder approvals for the business combination.

BVI-domiciled and China-based Yucheng Technologies Limited, providing IT solutions and services to China’s banking industry, in the end of February published press release where it announced the increase of its management guidance on POS terminal installation base from 20,000 to 25,000 for 2008. Yucheng’s CEO Mr. Weidong Hong commented on the management guidance increase: “Observing from our business momentum in Q1 and the strong prospects into the rest of 2008, we would like to reiterate our confidence in delivering the 2008 management guidance on revenue.”

The other news released is the change of the Chief Financial Officer: Remington Hu took the place of previous CFO Peter Li, who will remain with the BVI company as a senior advisor. Prior to Yucheng, Mr. Hu was previously in venture capital as Chief Representative/PRC for CVM Capital Partners LLC, one of the leading venture capital firms in Taiwan. Prior to CVM, Mr. Hu was the Chief Financial Officer of the Wholesale and Retail Business Group of publicly-traded Yue Yuen Industrial Holdings Limited, China’s largest sporting goods retailer.

Mr. Peter Li, who has been CFO of the BVI corporation in its way from a 300 employee private company to a 1,700 employee Nasdaq-listed industry leader, left the post to pursue other career interests and will continue to assist Yucheng with investor relations and strategy.

China Technology Development Group Corporation, British Virgin Islands company that provides clean and renewable energy products and solutions for solar energy business in China, announced that it has appointed Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu CPA Ltd.. to act as its independent auditor for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2007.

This appointment followed the expiry of the service term of Friedman LLP, and was based on recommendation and approval of the audit committee and the Board of Directors of China Technology on February 14, 2008. The reason for the change of the auditor was not any kind of disagreement between CTDC and Friedman, on matters of accounting principles or practices, financial statement disclosure, or auditing scope or procedure.

CEO of the company Charlene Hua commented on the appointment of the new auditor: “Given our strategic focus in the solar energy business in China, we believe that Deloitte’s strong presence in China will provide us with audit services that are more efficient and suitable for a rapidly growing company like ours. We also wish to thank Friedman for the excellent work and professional services provided by their team.”

BVI-domiciled China Technology Development Group Corporation has also a number of BVI subsidiaries, one of which, China Natures Technology Inc., about a month ago was disposed to an independent party for HK$10,000,000, pursuant to the sale and purchase agreement dated December 18, 2007.