Corporate digest

Neo Group

CATALIST-LISTED food solutions provider Neo Group has acquired a 51 per cent stake in Ye Liang How Catering Service Pte Ltd (How's Catering) for S$4.4 million, with the latter's existing owners to retain the remaining 49 per cent interest. The earnings accretive acquisition will be funded by a combination of S$3.6 million in cash and the issuance of 877,193 new shares at S$0.57 per share. An earn out consideration of S$0.3 million will also be payable, provided that How's Catering's aggregate consolidated net profit before tax for the 2019 to 2021 financial years, ended March 31 in each respective year, is more than S$4 million.

Datapulse Technology

DATAPULSE Technology, a media storage business looking to diversify out of the industry, on Monday said its chief executive officer Wilson Teng has resigned. The current chief financial officer, Lee Kam Seng, will take on the post of interim CEO from today.

It separately said that it has agreed with Catalist-listed ICP to terminate a plan to acquire ICP's hotel subsidiary Midscale Hotel Investments Pte Ltd.

Centurion Corporation

CENTURION, which owns and manages workers accommodation facilities as well as student housing assets, on Monday said it would buy South Korea's Benikea Hotel for S$16.6 million and refurbish it for use as student accommodation. The property, located in Seoul, will be converted from a 104-room three-star hotel into a 208-bed accommodation. The projected capital expenditure is about S$4.55 million.

MS Holdings

CRANE rental firm MS Holdings said on Monday it plans to explore a "strategic cooperation" with LongRunn International Group, a builder of integrated resorts in Asia, in acquiring a land parcel in the Incheon Free Economic Zone of South Korea. The cooperation, based on a non-binding memorandum of understanding, will have the partners develop the land parcel into a casino amenity as well as a complex for residential, commercial and tourism uses. The proposed project is valued at about US$80 million.