LISTED pharmacy software provider, Corum Group, says it has made significant progress in the last six months to position the business favourably in the market, with an enhanced product suite and improved organisational capability to facilitate growth.
The company's revenue for the half-year to 31 Dec 2019 was just over $5 million, a decrease of 14.3% on the prior period, with turnover in the Health Services division declining $603,000.
Corum's underlying operating result swung into the red, with the company recording a loss of $322,000, compared to the previous corresponding period where its underlying result was a $319,000 profit.
However the statutory result, a net loss after taxation and goodwill impairment of $304,000, was an improvement on the $2.29 million loss in 2018 when the company wrote off goodwill.
Some of the drop in sales during the first half of the 2019/20 financial year was due to longer timeframes for implementation of the new Corum Clear Dispense platform with contracted customers.
"Sales of Corum Clear Dispense were below expectations," the company noted.
Highlights of the six months included substantial software investment, including $700,000 spent on upgrades to existing platforms, along with $1.4 million on the development of Corum Clear Dispense and Corum Clear Enterprise.
Corum Clear Dispense was integrated with LOTS POS to make the platforms perform seamlessly together, while there were a number of broader Corum Clear Dispense integrations with third party products along with ongoing feature improvements driven by feedback from users.
The company also developed Android versions of legacy mobile platforms, and continued to support the LOTS suite of products with functionality enhancements and third party integrations.
Corporate developments included the signing of a Heads of Agreement with Pharmacy Alliance to supply solutions for both the company's head office as well as member pharmacies, and the completion of a $3.66 million capital raising to strengthen the balance sheet and "enable Corum to invest for the future".
Corum also completed contractual negotiations with BAMM Group Administration (PD 24 Sep 2019), the company led by Feras Karem and Assad Karem, who also own the Pharmacy4Less group.
The BAMM deal will see the businesses collaborate on the joint development of Corum Clear Head Office, a cloud-based enterprise product, "development of which is progressing well," Corum said.
Corum noted that it was also still owed $2.7 million by the PharmX joint venture, which is the subject of a dispute between some of the other unitholders (PD 06 Jan).
The Pharmacy Guild/Telstra-backed FRED IT Group, Mountaintop Systems and the parent company of Simple Retail, are also part of the PharmX ordering platform, with the Supreme Court ruling that the business must distribute dividends despite two members of the PharmX Unit Trust using their combined votes to block payments.
Corum said "the relevant unitholders involved, post the favourable Supreme Court of Victoria ruling in favour of releasing the unpaid revenue, are currently engaged in mediation, after completion of which payment is expected".
Looking forward, Corum said it was focused on the ongoing integrations and upgrades to Corum Clear Dispense to facilitate a faster market rollout, as well as the phase one launch of Corum Clear Enterprise.
The capital funding received will also allow the company to seek growth opportunities, Corum said.
The above article was sent to subscribers in Pharmacy Daily's issue from 19 Feb 20
To see the full newsletter, see the embedded issue below or CLICK HERE to download Pharmacy Daily from 19 Feb 20
