Given that there were no conditions mentioned in the announcement, we, the market, are I suppose, to assume that the contract is live right now? You're implying there may be a trail/PoC/integration period? This would need to be disclosed if it were the case.
I have bolded some sections in which this announcement may be against Listing Rules 3.1.
From the ASX:
|
Column 1 |
| 1 |
Recently there have been a number of incidents where the disclosures by listed entities about their contractual arrangements with customers have fallen short of the required standards. Examples include entities:
- announcing a contract with a major global customer without providing any details of the nature or substance of the contract or its significance to the entity (ie seeking to benefit from the association with the customer without providing proper disclosure);
- announcing what appears to be a material customer contract without disclosing that it is subject to a trial period or other conditions and therefore may not proceed;
- disclosing revenue projections for customer contracts that do not have a proper basis or that do not state the material assumptions or qualifications underpinning them;
- not disclosing when a previously announced material customer contract is terminated or does not proceed (ie disclosing good news but not bad); and
- misrepresenting customer contracts as being “material” or with other superlatives when plainly they are not (one of the more notable examples being a listed entity that disclosed a “material commercial agreement with a leading financial entity” under which it was to receive less than $1000 in revenue).
|
| 2 |
Whenever ASX detects this sort of behaviour it will not hesitate to suspend the entity, query it and require it to correct any inadequate or misleading disclosures. It will also refer the entity to ASIC for consideration of regulatory action.
|
I find the final dot-point interesting. Kind of broad to interpret. But announcing this contract with Fon as material, when in fact it seems no revenue may be generated, could be misleading. If what Shane has stated is to be read as "a customer buys a plan off us, which we outsource to Fon" then that leaves the door open to the possibility that in fact no-one, or very few people, use World Wifi and use Fon's services. This could mean, over the coming quarter, that NOR makes less than say $1000 in revenue from this deal. That could be considered misrepresenting a customer contract.
But I'm not the ASX and it is up to them to determine if this is indeed in breach of any rules. In this case it most likely isn't.
The announcement is, however, disappointing. And as I quoted earlier, previous World Wifi announcements stated this deal was to be in effect at launch.
