2 millions de Livres investis dans la société Skinkers Ltd (" Skinkers "), un spécialiste leader des communications " push " (AcT)

SPARK, l’organisation à capital-risque cotée en bourse focalisée sur les investissements au stade précoce dans les secteurs de la technologie, des médias et des télécoms, est heureuse d’annoncer son premier investissement nouveau en 3 ans. SPARK va investir £2 millions dans Skinkers Ltd, un leader dans la technologie du « desktop alert »

Etablie à Londres, Skinkers produit des desktop alerts qui représentent un canal professionnellement contrôlé vers le bureau des utilisateurs d’ordinateurs et leur garantissent de voir les messages importants au moment où ils en ont le plus besoin. ...

NewMedia SPARK PLC
9 February 2006

SPARK, the quoted venture capital organisation focused on early stage investments in the technology, media and telecoms sectors, is pleased to announce its first new investment in 3 years. SPARK will invest £2 million in Skinkers Ltd, a leader in desktop alert technology.

Based in London, Skinkers' desktop alerts are a business controlled channel to the desktop of computer users that guarantees important messages are seen when most needed.

With email communication starting to fail under the pressure of "spam" and viruses, it is crucial for business to be able to guarantee the delivery of important messages to both customers and employees.

Skinkers' blue chip client list includes the BBC, BSkyB, the FT, CNN, the Wall Street Journal, HBOS, Cisco Systems, Nortel, Halifax and the London Stock Exchange. They use Skinkers technology to deliver important messages to customers, staff and partners.

Skinkers have created a software technology that allows businesses of all sizes to quickly and cost-effectively deploy their own high-priority message delivery channel to the desktop of their employees or their customers worldwide.

Skinkers Alerts are very effective as they can:

• deliver messages at a predefined time
• support hundreds of thousands of users in a very cost effective way
• track how many people receive and interact with the messages
• deliver alerts both to anonymous and identified u sers
• control the look and feel of messages for brand control
• drive people to other information on the internet/intranet/ television/etc
• deliver large multimedia files in a highly optimised way

Skinkers will use the £2m investment to promote its existing services (branded RSS readers, security notifications, breaking news), finalise the development of its mobile offering and increase its international sales capabilities.

Commenting on the investment Andrew Carruthers, CEO of SPARK, stated:

"Following our successful exits from Footfall, Pricerunner and Elata we have started the process of looking for new investment opportunities and we are very pleased to have found this very exciting company. The growth in online advertising and the explosion of digital media has created many opportunities for entrepreneurs and we are now keen to use our experience to help this new generation of companies grow.

"Skinkers has a highly experienced management team and has created a market leading technology platform and product set that has proven its value to an impressive and growing blue chip client base. With the opportunities it now has with RSS and in the mobile space, Skinkers is poised for rapid expansion."

For further information please contact:

Notes to Editors

NewMedia SPARK plc

NewMedia SPARK is a quoted venture capital organisation based in central London focused on early stage investments in the technology, media and telecoms sectors. SPARK's portfolio has a particular emphasis on digital media, software applications, technology and communications. As an investor, SPARK expects to add significant value to its investments through active support and strategic direction. SPARK is listed on London's Alternative Investment Market.

For further information, see www.newmediaspark.com.

Source : Actusnews