British retailer Joules Group Plc has failed to secure the necessary financial support. Discussions with “several strategic investors” about participation in a capital increase and negotiations about possible bridge financing “remained unsuccessful and have now been ended,” the company admitted in a mandatory announcement on Monday.
Insolvency proceedings thus became inevitable. According to the report, the group’s management has requested that trustees be appointed “as soon as reasonably possible” for the individual companies concerned. Accordingly, the Board of Directors proposes Will Wright, Ryan Grant and Chris Pole from the management consultancy Interpath Advisory Limited as insolvency administrators for the entire group and the company Joules Limited. Wright and Grant are also to assume the same function at the subsidiaries The Garden Trading Company Limited and Joules Developments Limited. At the same time, the group’s management announced that stock exchange trading in the company’s shares would be suspended for the time being.
The ailing group of companies had recently introduced comprehensive reforms and was looking for the necessary funds to successfully continue on this course. Corresponding negotiations with the retail group Next Plc had already ended unsuccessfully in September. After the company admitted a week ago that business had been disappointing in the past few weeks, it now also had to announce that negotiations with other potential lenders had failed.