Adaptive Medias Completes Divestiture of Non-Performing Assets and Restructures Balance Sheet as it Repositions Company Into Pure Play Cannabis Company
1/12/18, 2:43 PM
IRVINE, CA , Jan. 12, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Adaptive Medias, Inc. (OTC: ADTM), formerly an ad-tech company, today issued the following Special Letter to Shareholders from its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, John B. Strong:
“Dear Fellow Shareholder:
Nearly two years ago, on April 14, 2016, we announced financial results for the
fiscal year ended December 31, 2015 of over $4.6 million in revenue. Revenue and
margins were trending positively with a fourth quarter gross profit that more
than doubled year over year to $457,340 on $1.68 million in
revenue.Concurrently, we were also working to close a merger with another ad
tech company that had developed a state-of-the-art ad blocker bypass software
program. However, market conditions did not support financing and closing that
transaction, and the effort’s extensive expenditure of cash and management
resources left the Company under-capitalized to invest in an aggressive ad-tech
business plan.
You can be assured, as one of the Company’s largest shareholders at the time, no
one was more disappointed than I at this turn of events. However, rather than
perform a large toxic financing that would have been highly dilutive to all
shareholders, we decided to ‘go dark,’ cut staff and suspend public reporting
company activities to conserve cash in hopes that we could develop a new,
streamlined business plan that could be executed with minimal capital
requirements.
Highlights:
Company has secured approximately $50 million from a mix of domestic hedge funds and foreign institutional investors to be redeployed to the most promising companies in the cannabis industry.Expects to rapidly become one of the leading providers of growth capital to the cannabis industry, based primarily on its two key competitive advantages: immediate access to capital and the turnaround time in approving and funding new loansNew management team used last two years to streamline operations, eliminate majority of long-term obligations to prepare for its debutExpects to announce new management team, company name and ticker symbol shortly as part of transition
Company Begins Transition into Pure Cannabis Play
Interestingly, during this transition period, a historic phenomenon began to
take place - - the legalization of cannabis in both the United States and Canada
for both medicinal and recreational uses. This single event, which essentially
was responsible for the creation of a multi-billion-dollar market overnight,
will prove to become one of the most important events in the history of the
United States. It will also prove to become one of the greatest financial
opportunities offered to the thousands of entrepreneurs that this nation was
built on since the days of the gold rush and the dot com era.
Given the industry’s rapid emergence as one of the fastest growing markets in
the United States, it is also no dark secret that the companies that had
first-mover advantage would always be leap years ahead of their competition. And
our situation is no different. After a comprehensive analysis of the market and
its potential opportunities, we felt that the most lucrative for us would be to
help finance and grow what would no doubt develop into thousands of new entrants
into the market.
Accordingly, we formed a Special In-house Committee and delegated one and only
one task to them: to develop and begin the implementation of a new business plan
that was achievable in the short-run, sustainable in the long-run and had the
potential to generate the highest return on invested capital for our
shareholders. After a thorough due diligence and vetting process, we unanimously
decided that it would be in our best interest to divest the Company of its
existing assets to generate the needed cash to pay down nearly all of our debt
obligations and even provide for some initial working capital to support our
entry into the rapidly growing and very exciting legal cannabis industry, an
opportunity that we will no doubt experience only once in a lifetime. However,
please do keep in mind that we had to overcome many obstacles to ensure our
ability to carve ourselves a small but very lucrative and growing niche in the
cannabis industry. These obstacles ranged from the settling of lawsuits stemming
from the Company’s former regime to what personally was the most difficult for
me - - the laying-off of some of the most loyal and talented employees I have
had the pleasure of working with when I initially joined Adaptive Medias.
Unfortunately, these were not easy decisions to make but were necessary if we
had any hope or aspirations that our shareholders could one day begin recouping
their losses from their investment, which based on the market’s reaction is
already beginning to show a positive reaction to our new business strategy.
U.S. Legal Cannabis Market Expected to Exceed $21 Billion by 2021
According to Arcview Market Research, a third-party provider of unbiased
research to the cannabis industry, consumer spending on legal cannabis in the
U.S. grew by over 34% in 2016 over 2015 and is expected to grow to a new high of
over $6.7 billion in 2021. As additional states legalize the use of cannabis, an
increasing number of Americans will have access to cannabis. Democratic member,
representative Earl Blumenauer noted that, "More than two-thirds of Americans
now live in jurisdictions that have legalized either the medical or adult use of
marijuana." In addition to dealing with chronic pain, the report indicated that
states with legalized medical cannabis have a very easily measurable amount of
deaths due to overdosing on other drugs such as opioid painkillers. The report
also stated that, "in November, the journal of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science published a study finding that the annual rate of deaths
due to overdose on opioid painkillers was nearly 25% lower in states that
permitted medical marijuana, and that the effect had grown stronger in the five
years after states approved medical marijuana."
Accordingly, we decided to completely shift our business strategy from one that
focused on ad-tech to one that would help meet an absolute necessity for any new
entrant into this market: access to capital and access at a quicker pace than
our competition. While it is very true that the financing of the cannabis
industry is not the sexiest or most exciting proposition, it is one of the
safest and most secure investments one can make, particularly when considering
the almost daily changes and evolving legislations relating to the industry.
However, we didn’t stop there. We wanted to make sure that we not only
capitalized on this market opportunity but capitalized on it in a significant
manner and that’s when we decided to completely divest what was left of Adaptive
Medias and form an entirely new entity, which will be announced next week, that
should rather quickly solidify its position in the market as a “one-stop-shop”
for services ranging from financing to merchandising. And again, the two factors
that will enable us to capture the largest percentage of the industry’s market
share will be due to immediate access to growth capital and the speed that we
can close a loan from inception to funding - - which we believe can be done in
as quickly as 20-30 days compared to the industry’s current average pace of over
90 days.
Through the implementation of the First Phase of our business plan this month,
we are confident we can reach positive cash flow very shortly. We are also
working diligently towards gaining our status as a fully reporting company with
the SEC and relaunching a shareholder relations program that will be designed to
keep you updated on every step of our progress.
We expect to have further developments to report to you later this month and all
throughout the first half of 2018. I appreciate your support and confidence and
look forward to keeping you updated.
Sincerely yours,
John B. Strong Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
ABOUT ADAPTIVE MEDIAS, INC. Adaptive Medias, Inc. (ADTM) is a leading provider
of mobile video delivery and monetization solutions for publishers, content
producers and advertisers. The Company’s comprehensive mobile video technology
platform, Media Graph, facilitates the delivery of integrated, engaging video
content and impactful ad units across all screens and devices.
FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS
This Press Release may contain certain forward-looking statements within the
meaning of the Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Adaptive Medias, Inc.
has tried, whenever possible, to identify these forward-looking statements using
words such as "anticipates," "believes," "estimates," "expects," "plans,"
"intends," "potential" and similar expressions. These statements reflect
Adaptive Medias' current beliefs and are based on information currently
available to it. Accordingly, such forward-looking statements involve known and
unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which could cause Adaptive
Medias' actual results, performance or achievements to differ materially from
those expressed in or implied by such statements, including without limitation;
the risk of downturns in the ad-tech industry; the effects of local and national
economic, credit and capital market conditions on the economy in general, and
other risks and uncertainties described herein, as well as those risks and
uncertainties discussed from time to time in our other reports and other public
filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC"). Adaptive
Medias undertakes no obligation to update or provide advice in the event of any
change, addition or alteration to the information contained in this Press
Release including such forward-looking statements.
Investor/Media Contact:
James Chen
Vice President, Investor Relations
Phone: (855) FUND-420
Company Contact:
John B. Strong
Chairman & CEO
Phone: (855) FUND-420
Image: Primary Logo
Source: Adaptive Me
News 
Market Data 
Discover 
