The Australian Financial Review is today reporting that Vocus Communications Limited (ASX: VOC) founder and leading digital services expert James Spenceley has identified two stocks as potential 'NBN winners'.
Mr. Spenceley founded dark fibre and data-centre company Vocus around 8 years ago and grew it into a $5 billion giant largely via an aggressive merger and acquisition strategy.
However, the final deal to accept a reverse takeover by the larger M2 combined telco group led to Mr. Spenceley's departure from Vocus soon after he sold around $26 million worth of shares in the business.
The heavy share selling was followed by an odd attempt to have the newly-combined group's CEO removed in a low-credibility plot given Mr. Spenceley had just sold the majority of his own shares in the business. This was a market-rattling move that has heaped pressure on the Vocus share price, with the company due to provide an update at its November 29 AGM.
Subsequent to his departure Mr. Spenceley left Vocus to start up a funds management business named MHOR, which has reportedly identified two particular small caps as good opportunities given the transformative effects of Australia's National Broadband Network (NBN).
Given Mr. Spenceley's technological expertise and track record in building businesses it's worth taking a look at what he likes.
Amaysim Australia Ltd (ASX: AYS) is the sim-only mobile phone plan operator that offers cheap deals to win market share due to its low-cost, asset light, business model. Its deals are increasingly popular with cost conscious consumers or short-term visitors and the company still trades on a reasonable valuation given the strong subscriber growth.
It has also recently moved into home broadband in a deliberate attempt to leverage the critical churn event of household migration to the NBN network. The stock sells for $2.17 and could offer investors strong returns if management is able to execute on its NBN opportunity and other growth ambitions.
Nextdc Ltd (ASX: NXT) is a data-centre business that has some powerful tailwinds due to the still exponentially-increasing demand for data and cloud services. It has been investing capital in data centres in Sydney and Melbourne with a strong outlook and excellent operating leverage in that once upfront capital investment has been made the group can add fee-paying clients to its data centre services for little extra cost.
James Spenceley has a superb track record as a businessman and his tech picks are worth paying attention to with Amaysim up 1.4% and Nextdc up 0.5% today respectively.
