Financier Peter Lynch is backing his former Eircom colleague Robert Haulbrook in new US business that plans to establish a chain of 50 mobile phone stores in Atlanta, Georgia.
Mr Lynch's vehicle, Prime Active Capital, the printing and card services groups formerly known as Oakhill, will invest $5 million (€3.46 million) up front to take a 49 per cent stake in Mr Haulbrook's company Cellular Center LLC, which is currently opening its 20th store.
As chief executive of Eircom's mobile unit Meteor until last May, Mr Haulbrook was credited with turning that company's fortunes around with a significant growth in subscriber numbers and market share.
Prime Active Capital plans to enter the deal via a wholly owned subsidiary called PAC Telemedia LLC. "The funds are to be applied to the creation and establishment of the business model and to proof of concept," Mr Lynch said.
"Prime Active Capital nominees will join the board of Cellular Center LLC and will also provide corporate finance, banking and strategic advice going forward."
A former finance director at Eircom, Mr Lynch took the helm at Prime Active Capital last May. He owns 20 per cent of the firm.
His association with Mr Haulbrook dates to Eircom's acquisition in mid-2005 of Meteor. Mr Haulbrook is now chairman of that company, which increased its subscriber base by 28 per cent to 875,000 in the year to June.
Citing Eircom's purchase of Meteor, Mr Lynch said the Cellular Center deal represented a second opportunity for him to back Mr Haulbrook in another developing business.
"We have significant confidence in the ability of Robert to continue his record of success and substantial added value for shareholders," he said.
"Cellular Center is now opening the 20th store and should be up to 25 stores by quarter one next year. It is our intention to aggressively build the chain up to 50 stores in this phase one, proof- of-concept stage, while we develop good systems, good outlets and assemble an excellent team.
"The funding currently available to the company should bring us up to that level. The shareholders of Cellular Center LLC would have substantial scale ambition for the company."
Mr Haulbrook said: "The idea that drives Cellular Center is very simple. We offer a similar look, style and feel to the major mobile network stores, but with a customer experience that is superior. Our sales associates are some of the best trained and motivated employees in the industry and we only represent the best brands in the market.
"In Georgia, we exclusively sell Verizon Wireless, the leader in customer satisfaction."
He added: "We were recently offered an opportunity to expand with Verizon Wireless into several nearby states. When we realised the expansion opportunity called for a level of investment that we could not fund on our own, I turned to a few trusted investors and quickly settled on Prime Active Capital.
"In addition to the required investment, we also get in Peter Lynch a trusted advisor and strategist to help us work through what we expect to be another high growth business."
In July, Mr Lynch told Prime Active Capital shareholders he wanted to increase turnover from about €30 million to €400 million through acquisitions in the printing and telecoms sectors.
