SMART Metering Systems, the Glasgow-based company that installs and manages smart meters, is halting all but emergency field work as a result of the coronavirus outbreak.
The move includes temporarily shelving the installation of smart meters until further notice, it said in a statement to the London Stock Exchange.
It said it will continue to provide emergency field support and related activities and will maintain its extensive IT infrastructure which supports its existing meter and data asset base and the index-linked annual recurring revenues generated by its assets.
READ MORE: Scottish energy company sells assets to raise £291m
The firm has closed all its offices and warehouses except for activities required to support emergency field activity and IT infrastructure with a majority of the workforce continuing to work and support customers from home.
The company earlier revealed it had conditionally sold a minority of its meter assets for a total gross cash consideration of £291 million to funds managed by Equitix Investment Management.
It said in its update that, on completion, the net cash consideration of £282m will go towards the immediate repayment of amounts under the group’s existing £420m debt facility and result in a positive net cash position.
READ MORE: Smart meters group in talks over buyer hunt
It also means the firm will have retained index-linked annual recurring revenues of £73.2m as at February 29 2020, “all of which remains unaffected by the temporary measures being taken”.
The company said: “The Covid-19 situation is evolving rapidly and whilst the impact on the short-term financial performance of the business cannot be accurately quantified at this time, the combination of the group’s robust balance sheet, high-quality, index-linked recurring revenue streams and a contracted order book of two million smart meters ensures that the longer-term impact on the group will be minimal.”
SMS shares were up 7%, or 40p at 611p.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here