Telepanel Announces Election Of Robert Zwartendijk To Board Of Directors
TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 16, 1999--(TSE: TLS.) (OTC BB: TLSXF)
Institutional Investors Provide Additional Financing
Telepanel Systems Inc. (TSE: TLS) (OTC BB: TLSXF), the leader in wireless electronic shelf label (ESL) systems for retail stores, today announced the election of Robert Zwartendijk of Amsterdam, Netherlands, to its Board of Directors.
Mr. Zwartendijk, served as Chief Executive Officer, President and a member of the Corporate Executive Board of Royal Ahold, a leading international supermarket chain, from 1981 until his retirement. From 1989 to 1998, he was President of Ahold USA, Inc. Under his leadership, Ahold became one of the largest supermarket chains in the United States, with more than 1,000 stores and annual sales of USD$16.2 billion.
Prior to joining Ahold in 1977, Mr. Zwartendijk held executive positions at Unilever, Polaroid and Molnlycke. In addition to Telepanel, Mr. Zwartendijk serves on the board of several public corporations in North America and Europe.
"We are very pleased to have Mr. Zwartendijk on our board," commented Mr. Skillen. "His expertise in the retail industry, in both Europe and the United States, will be an asset to Telepanel as we lead the electronic shelf label industry into the new century."
Mr. Zwartendijk was elected to the Board at the Annual Meeting of the Company on October 13, 1999.
In additional news, Telepanel today announced it has completed $600,000 of convertible financing from Royal Bank Ventures Inc., formerly Royal Bank Capital Corporation (as to $150,000) and The VenGrowth Investment Fund Inc. (as to $450,000), the Company's major institutional investors.
"This financing will allow Telepanel to continue with its business development activities and allow the company to move forward to complete its long-term financing", said Chris Skillen, President and CEO of Telepanel.
In return for the bridge financing, Telepanel issued debentures convertible into Telepanel common equity. The debentures contain a right (and in certain cases, an obligation) to convert the indebtedness into common shares at a conversion price of $2.05 per share.
VenGrowth currently owns 1,556,447 common shares or 8.2% of the current number of common shares of Telepanel (18,909,645) and RBVI currently owns 93,334 Telepanel common shares, or 0.5% of the current number of common shares of Telepanel. Based on what the Company, RBVI and VenGrowth anticipate, this financing, together with the previous financings of the Company by RBVI and VenGrowth, will result in VenGrowth owning, or holding securities convertible into or exercisable for (assuming the conversion or exercise rights are fully exercised), approximately 5,142,498 or 20.4% of the outstanding common shares of Telepanel following such conversion, and RBVI holding securities convertible into or exercisable for (assuming the conversion or exercise rights are fully exercised) 2,794,006 or 11.1% of the outstanding common shares of Telepanel following such conversion. RBVI and VenGrowth have no agreement or arrangement respecting the voting of their securities or the acquisition of any further securities of Telepanel. Pursuant to its governing legislation, VenGrowth is not permitted to acquire previously issued securities in the market.
Telepanel is the leader in developing wireless electronic shelf labelling systems for retail stores. Telepanel display modules are placed on the edge of store shelves to show a product's price and other information. Prices are changed by a radio communications link to the store's cash registers, to provide accurate and up-to-date pricing.
Telepanel's new proprietary Millennium PLUS technology delivers to the market an advanced, wireless, high bandwidth, radio frequency communications technique that makes use of unlicensed communications bands in North America and Europe. Millennium PLUS leads the industry in low cost, reliable, high throughput communication to tens of thousands of wireless devices within each customer space.
Approximately 2,000,000 Telepanel wireless display modules are presently installed and operating throughout the United States, Canada, and in Europe. Telepanel installations are at such premier supermarkets and warehouse chains as Adam's Super Food Stores, A & P, Stop & Shop, Loblaws, Big Y, Reasor's, Wakefern, Grand Union, Sam's Clubs, Shaw's, Brown's, Doll's, Berks, Ellington, Port Richmond, Stew Leonard's, Champion, Leclerc, Intermarche, SPAR, Pingo Doce, and Super U and at Universal Studios, Hollywood.
This press release includes forward looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements do not constitute historical facts and involve risks and uncertainties, including, but not limited to, the possibility that adverse economic or other factors may cause actual results to be materially different than current estimates and projections. Additional detailed information concerning a number of factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the information contained in this press release is contained in the reports and other documents of Telepanel filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission from time to time.
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Contact:
In Canada
Chris Skillen, Telepanel Systems Inc.
905/477-7877
or
In the US
Irving Straus, 212/768-2477
or
Mallory Factor
Mallory Factor Inc., 212/350-0000
Internet: www.telepanelsystems.com |
