what happened, page-5

Pleasure, muppet655.

I am positive about current management - although we could only improve on what we had!

Re the new contracts, I think they are encouraging in the sense that: 1) some are from existing clients, showing WDS has some goodwill; and 2) some are for work outside the usual scope, which means that they are diversifying their service offering. However, I think the bottom line impact of these new contracts will probably be marginal, as to some extent they will simply be replacing existing work.

I think the takeover angle is interesting on this. IMO, I see three possibilities:

1) Pala "privatise" it - they have a private equity track record;

2) They get taken over by a competitor looking to increase their capacity who view them as a bargain due to this years massive price drop - at one point, it was trading at less than the value of its P&E and the current price, quite reasonably, factors in very little, if any, "goodwill" (ie value above net assets)

3) A bit more left field, but they get taken over by one of the CSG majors looking to "vertically integrate" a contractor to ensure reliable supply of construction services (and to make one less contractor available to their competitors) - I admit this is a bit out there.

Should either happen, it should react favourably and perhaps us long suffering shareholder will get some fair value. As a long termer, its fluctuations over the short-to-medium term don't trouble me so much. What will trouble me is management incompetence and lack of turnaround on CSG contracts - that the name of the game for these guys!