Shares in RPMGlobal Holdings Ltd (ASX: RUL) are down slightly this morning following news of an acquisition. The RPMGlobal share price is currently $1.68 — down 0.59% on yesterday's close.
The planned purchase of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) service provider Nitro Solutions Pty Ltd will see RPMGlobal create a dedicated ESG mining division.
Let's take a closer look at today's news from the mining software solutions company.
New acquisition
After Nitro's acquisition, RPMGlobal will bring all its ESG professionals into a single division headed by Nitro's founder, Ngaire Tranter.
RPMGlobal plans to use Nitro's knowledge of ESG to acquire or build software that will provide ESG services to mining companies.
Nitro currently provides the mining industry with ESG services. These services include environmental approvals, impact assessment, regulatory and legislation advice, environmental audits and economics, and compliance reporting.
Nitro is set to cost RPMGlobal around $1.68 million in cash and $160,000 worth of RPMGlobal shares. The purchase will also include a working capital adjustment of around $259,000 60 days after completion of the acquisition.
According to RPMGlobal, the cash components of the acquisition will come from its existing cash reserves. RPMGlobal will provide Nitro with 95,941 shares at the five-day average volume weighted closing price of $1.667 apiece.
The acquisition will close on 30 June, subject to conditions.
Commentary from management
RPMGlobal CEO and managing director Richard Mathews commented on the acquisition:
Whilst our mining advisory ESG professionals have been engaged to perform and manage numerous ESG mandates around the world, until now we have not had a dedicated division focused solely on ESG…
Ngaire and her team have an excellent reputation within the mining ESG market which gives us great confidence that we can build a world-class mining-focused ESG business leveraging an ESG team that knows and understands mining from the ground up.
RPMGlobal share price snapshot
So far, 2021 has been a good year for the RPMGlobal share price on the ASX.
Currently, the RPMGlobal share price is 32% higher than it was at the start of the year. It has also gained 62% since this time last year.
The company has a market capitalisation of around $387 million, with approximately 229 million shares outstanding.