Investment in AFT Pharmaceuticals Ltd

The Milford Active Growth Funds (both KiwiSaver and PIE) have just acquired a circa 3% stake in the NZ based AFT Pharmaceuticals Ltd.  The Funds invested in new equity alongside the US based healthcare investor, Capital Royalty (which provided both debt and equity to the business). 

AFT Pharmaceutical, with revenues of $66 million, predominately sells into the NZ and Australian markets, to both public and private hospitals and through pharmacies.  The company has a large range of products, but is best known in NZ for its Maxigesic product.  Maxigesic was invented, developed and patented by AFT and has been licenced to over 40 countries.  With its pipeline of new products, and the potential to commercialise its current products globally, Milford believes the company will be a NZ success story. 

Success at the NZ Hi-Tech awards

Orion Health and Vend were two big success stories from the Hi-Tech awards hosted in Christchurch on Friday night.  The Milford Active Growth Funds are invested in both companies. 

Orion Health, which develops and implements large computer systems to improve the efficiency of hospitals around the world, took the big award for the night – the PwC Hi-Tech Company of the Year Award for 2014.  It also picked up the NZMEA Hi-Tech Exporter of the Year Award for companies over $5m. 

Vend, which develops point of sale software for retailers, picked up the Cisco Hi-Tech Emerging Company of the Year Award and, for the second year running, the IBM Hi-Tech Exporter of the year Award for companies under $5m.  Vend will not be eligible for this award in the coming years due to the rapid growth of the company.

These investments demonstrate that the Milford Active Growth Funds are finding good NZ success stories and backing them to enable the companies to grow fast, successfully, and compete on a global scale.  We believe that investing in these companies will not only provide strong returns for our investors over time, but it will also grow the wealth of the country.

Brooke Bone

Senior Equity Analyst