Datalex, the Irish travel software firm, has announced a major management reshuffle that will see its founder, Mr Neil Wilson, resign as executive chairman and several directors leave the board.
Mr Wilson, the largest shareholder in Datalex, with around 20 per cent of the firm's shares, will remain on the board and will lead a new "task force" designed to boost sales.
Datalex's vice-president of business development, Mr Justin Morshead, also announced yesterday he would retire in June after the task force was set up.
Mr Morshead joined Datalex in 1999 following its acquisition of Teamwork Solutions, a firm which he co-founded.
Two other Datalex executives, Mr Paul Addy and Mr James Peters, will resign as executive board members in a move to create a primarily non-executive board of directors, the firm said in a statement. They will remain with the firm as executives.
Analysts interpreted the management reshuffle as a clear sign that the remaining institutional investors in Datalex wanted a "fundamental management change".
Datalex recently faced strong criticism from observers because there was a small number of non-executive directors on the board. The firm recently moved to address these criticisms by appointing Mr Michael Quinn, former chief executive of ICC Bank.
The struggling firm, which has seen its market capitalisation plummet to below $10 million (€11.35 million) following the terrorist attacks on September 11th, also said it would delist its shares from the Nasdaq exchange on April 25th in a move designed to save up to $1 million per annum.
Mr Frank Mantero, global public relations director with Datalex, said the firm would save between $500,000 to $1 million by delisting from the Nasdaq.
Datalex will convert its secondary listing on the Irish stock exchange to a primary listing, and its shares will be tradable on the US over-the-counter market.
Mr Mantero said the main reason for delisting was that just 5 per cent of the firm's shareholders were based in the US and Datalex had no institutional shareholders based in the US.
A significant US institutional shareholder, a Colorado-based institution, bailed out of the firm after September 11th, precipitating a steep decline in Datalex shares.
The shares, which traded at highs of more than $10 in 2001, have fallen below $1 since February 2002 because of declining revenues. At its last quarterly results, the firm reported revenues had almost halved to $5.5 million, from $10.8 million a year earlier.
Mr Mantero said yesterday the first quarter had been pretty good to date, but declined to set a new break-even target for the firm. Datalex had originally forecast to break even in the first quarter of 2002. In the last quarter it reported losses of $5.6 million.
Datalex will report its first-quarter results for 2002 on May 14th. Its shares closed unchanged at 35 cents last night in Dublin.
