There is a very interesting IPO coming out on Wednesday, Dec 20 on
the Toronto Stock Exchange over the counter market. The company
is called Certicom, and it has several data security products that
are leading edge, involving data encryption/decryption through public
key cryptology using eliptical curve computations (ECC).
They have applied this technology to fax encryption, wireless modem
transmissions, and are in talks with Netscape and VISA International
to apply ECC to the internet and in the upcoming smart cards.
The current public key security system used by Netscape has been
cracked by European hackers and is not viewed as being robust enough
for widescale commercial transactions on the internet. ECC has been
demonstrated to be substantially more robust because of the
complicated algorithms utilized. Certicom has patented several
applications that use this computationally intense security system,
yet on a very efficient process. They are concluding trials with
Motorola and VISA and could be in position to announce significant
contracts in 1Q 1996.
They have current revenues with the likes of Motorola, the nationwide
banks in Canada, various branches of the Canadian Government, and
the Social Security System and IRS in the US.
The IPO is a very tight deal. Institutions will hold over 70% of the
shares after the IPO. 4 institutions are long term shareholders and
they hold 60%. There are only 3 million shares underwritten in the IPO,
and the issue price is C$ 3.00. The company intends to do a secondary
issue on NASDAQ in the next 6 months. The deal is oversubscribed,
however this stock is set up for very favorable performance and should
be a great trader. If you are familiar with the recent IPO of Secure
Computing (SCUR - NASDAQ) lead by Piper Jaffray, this represents the
ultimate possible outcome. I will post the ticker symbol here next week.
You can get a prospectus from Phil Gow at Trinity Capital Corp. at
(416) 862-7168. |
