Iofina

History

Iofina was incorporated on 15 March 2005 in the UK and registered in England and Wales. It was co-founded by Lance Baller and Jeff Ploen. In January 2006 the Group acquired the entire issued share capital of Iofina Inc. their US based Company and its wholly owned subsidiary Iofina Natural Gas Inc., each of which is a Colorado corporation, with the objective of becoming a low cost producer of iodine and natural gas. The group successfully completed its IPO and was admitted for trading on 9 May 2008 on the London Stock Exchange AIM market by Mirabaud Securities. Iofina's IPO was awarded the "AIM: Float of the year in 2008" by Investor's Chronicle. In 2009 the Group's wholly owned subsidiary Iofina Chemical, Inc acquired Kentucky based H&S Chemical, a small specialty chemical producer doing under $10 million USD in revenue, purchased for $8.5 million USD. Under Mr. Baller's tenure convertible debt of $20 million with a 6% coupon was placed for Iofina at above market pricing along with three secondary offerings totaling over $55 million, all at above market pricing from institutional investors. Blackrock, JP Morgan, Stena Investments, UBS and Legal and General were the largest institutional shareholders in every round.

In 2012 Iofina Natural Gas was rebranded to Iofina Resources. Mr. Baller was able to turn Iofina from a start up in late 2005 into a profitable company with a market capitalization of around a half a billion dollars while having to create new technology and reinvent Iofina's business plan. The Group was EBITDA positive and had a good amount of cash on the balance sheet from the launch of the Group's high producing IO#2 IOsorb plant. Mr. Baller was able to put in place an untapped Convertible Bond placing of $15 million with shareholder Stena Investments with the conversion price set at a price of US$3.21 (GBP 2.06 converted into US dollars at the GBP:USD exchange rate) (the "Conversion Price") representing a 10 per cent. premium to the shares closing price that day. If not converted or previously redeemed the Bond would be redeemed at par upon their maturity 2 years from the Closing Date. The Bond was extended until 2020.

Mr. Baller had to resign for health reasons and left the Company in 2013. The Board did a search and added George Lantz as CEO and Gary Gatchell as CFO who both had been executives at NASDAQ listed Company's and worked together for Voyant Technologies. With the new management team in place the Group decided to build four IOsorb plants that year and expand aggressively. The group quickly went through its cash and convertible bond money. The management team had delays, poor site planning, difficult work environment and large cost overruns which caused every institutional shareholder to exit the shares. The Group was not able to sell the iodine that it was producing. In 2014 the Groups Chairman Dr. Chris Fay, a former chairman and CEO of Shell UK stepped down. Mr. Baller was reappointed to the Board of Iofina as non-executive Chairman and Dr. William D. Bellamy was added to the board of directors. Dr. Bellamy was the Senior Vice President of the Water Business Group CH2M Hill, Inc, a company he had worked for over 30 years. It was very obvious to Mr. Baller the company was going in the wrong direction as the share price was near a 52-week low, little working capital and large inventory. Mr. Baller asked for and accepted the resignations of Mr. Lantz and Mr. Gatchell. Mr. Baller ran the company as chairman and immediately had to do a $5 million unsecured Convertible Bond for working capital purposes. The Bond was issued at par and had an annual coupon of 6% payable quarterly in arrears. The Bond was convertible into fully paid ordinary shares of the Company at a conversion price equivalent to 40 pence per Ordinary Share, which was a 5.6% premium to the closing price of 37.75p that day. The company had the right to elect conversion of the Bond if the share price traded at 80 pence per Ordinary Share (being a one hundred per cent. premium above the conversion price) for five consecutive trading days. The Company immediately came out with monthly production updates and the two recently appointed directors and the company's senior management reduced their compensation to £1 until further notice. Those reductions implemented, afforded the company a reduction of circa $650,000 per annum without negatively affecting field operations, as the Company focused on bottom line performance.

After stabilising the company for five months, the Group announced its new CEO appointment of Dr. Thomas Becker. Dr. Becker was the current President & CEO of Iofina Chemical, Inc. Under his four years of management, Iofina Chemical had experienced record expansion, revenues and profits. Dr. Becker holds a PhD from the University of Cincinnati and a BS from Indiana University, both in Chemistry. Lance J Baller, co-founder and chairman commented at the time: "Tom has shown he is the ideal candidate to lead Iofina through its next stage of development. His proven success at Iofina Chemical and extensive knowledge and connections within the global iodine industry are well recognised. Tom's leadership will guide Iofina forward as we continue to grow and optimize our company-wide operations." The Group reduced its losses, shut down ill located plants and reduced inventory. The Group went from being a low cost producer, then to a high cost producer and now was slowly working back to a low cost producer.

Iofina became a founding member of the World Iodine Association ("WIA") on 14 October 2015. The mission of the WIA is to support and represent iodine producers, processors, formulators, distributors and end users in relevant industry and official government bodies around the world, with respect to guidelines and regulations on iodine and its derivatives. Alongside Iofina, other founding members of the WIA includes Ajay Europe, Calibre Chemicals, GE Healthcare, Hypred SAS and SQM Europe. The WIA develops, supports and promotes the use of iodine and its derivatives in existing and novel uses and applications in the domains of human and animal health and industry. The WIA provides information about the purposes, uses and applications of iodine and its derivatives to interested parties and aims to help eradicate global iodine deficiency. Dr. Becker serves on the board of directors of WIA.