After months of acrimony and several days of expensive court hearings, the case brought by Hawthorn Glen, a major shareholder in Australia-based construction collaboration vendor Aconex, against the company and its joint managing directors Leigh Jasper and Rob Phillpot has been settled out of court.
The Federal Court of Australia earlier today made a brief order:
“1. The proceeding be dismissed.
2. There be no order as to costs.”
The terms of the settlement are apparently confidential.
However, this conclusion does beg the question “why didn’t the parties reach an agreement months ago?” After all, the case began almost exactly a year ago (21 May 2007), will have consumed considerable management time, and there was a financial impact on the business (as I noted reading Aconex’s results last year) of some Au$1.65 million (about £0.72m) up to 30 June 2007. With the main court hearings taking place over several days during
October, it remains to be seen what impact the case will have had on Aconex’s performance in this financial year.
Update (27 May 2008): Having asked Aconex for a comment, I today got the following from Rob Phillpot:
“On Friday, the court ordered that the Hawthorn Glen proceeding be dismissed with no order as to costs. Aconex is delighted that the matters in dispute with Hawthorn Glen have been finally resolved and we look forward to a constructive relationship moving forward as a shareholder.”
Related posts
- Aconex shares row – another twist (14 March 2008)
- Hawthorn Glen v Aconex – latest (14 December 2007)
- Aconex results hit by legal row (12 December 2007)
- Aconex court case – date set for October (24 September 2007)
- Aconex in Australia shares court row (22 August 2007)
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[…] Amid more commentary about the affair, FirmSpy then provides a copy of the EGM ‘Questions on Notice’ document which asks some detailed questions about the role of AAR not just in the EGM but in the original year-long dispute between Aconex and Hawthorn Glen that was thought resolved in May 2008 (post). […]
[…] over three years since an Aconex shareholder dispute with the management team was settled out of court, another legal action began on Monday in Melbourne – as I noted on Friday. The Australian […]