Troubled Epicentre Holdings to sell SGX listing status for S$3m

EPICENTRE Holdings has agreed to transfer its listing status on the Singapore Exchange's Catalist board for S$3 million to an unnamed entity that will be incorporated in Singapore with the support of South Korea-listed steel product manufacturer Kossen.

Epicentre, formerly an Apple authorised reseller, is currently under judicial management, and its shares are suspended from trading. One of its major intangible assets is its listing status, its judicial managers said in an exchange filing.

Its judicial managers said the company has entered into an implementation agreement with Kossen and Tardis Capital, a Singapore-based mergers-and-acquisitions advisory firm. Tardis was the one that introduced Kossen and the transferee to the judicial managers.

Upon the transfer, Epicentre's shares will be delisted and withdrawn from the Catalist board.

The filing says information on the transferee is currently unavailable, and Epicentre "is given to understand" that the transferee intends to undergo an internal reorganisation. This means its financial information, such as its book value and net tangible asset value, would be available only "in due course", the filing said.

The transferee's business is in the business of manufacturing, wholesale and retail of lactobacillus health products, it added.

GET BT IN YOUR INBOX DAILY

Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox.

Sign UpVIEW ALL

Kossen, key shareholder of BiogenicsKorea, will procure the incorporation of the transferee and ensure that the shares of BiogenicsKorea will be wholly-owned by the transferee, it said.

Epicentre, which opened in 2002, sold all its four storefronts in June 2018, citing stiff competition as a reason for its poor sales. At one point in 2011, it had more than 10 stores in Singapore, Malaysia and China.

In early December 2019, the company's former chief executive officer and executive chairman Kenneth Lim was reported to be facing a bankruptcy petition over a debt of S$588,020.

However, he had been uncontactable since late May that year. The company requested a trading suspension shortly after his disappearance and fired him in July 2019.