HiberGene shareholders vote to appoint liquidator despite discontent

Shareholders in HiberGene Diagnostics have approved winding up the company and appointing a liquidator despite a large minority objecting to the company’s choice of accountant to lead the liquidation.

The Sandyford, Dublin business – which brought its first product, a meningitis test, to market in 2015 – collapsed last month amid a flurry of recriminations and disputes over the running of the company and what some shareholders say has been a lack of transparency around HiberGene’s finances and decisions made at board level.

On Friday, the company confirmed in a statement that accountant Colin Gaynor of Resolute Advisory had been appointed as liquidator at a meeting of the creditors.

According to the statement of the company’s affairs provided to creditors, HiberGene owes in excess of €1.3 million to unsecured creditors, including more than €197,000 to Enterprise Ireland. Employees of the company are owed a total of almost €305,000.

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Having declined to answer questions put to the company by The Irish Times since filing a notice of insolvency in late August, chief executive David Corr, speaking on behalf of HiberGene’s board, said in a statement: “The company has been the subject of several articles in the media in recent weeks. The directors maintain that they have at all times acted in accordance with the Companies Act and in the best interest of the members and its creditors.

“The recent allegations are wholly rejected and the directors have committed to provide any and all assistance required of them by the liquidator or any other statutory authority.”

Some shareholders say they still have questions, not just about the running of the company and its finances, but about an extraordinary general meeting (egm) and the creditors’ meeting that took place on Friday, and how this process was handled.

Brendan Farrell, a direct shareholder and former chief executive of HiberGene, said he was not allowed to attend the virtual egm of the company’s shareholders that took place on Friday morning before the meeting of creditors.

Mr Farrell, also a former chief executive of Trinity Biotech, cofounded HiberGene and served on the board until 2018. He told The Irish Times he did not receive a Zoom link to the virtual egm on Friday and was subsequently told he could not attend because he had not registered beforehand. “I’ve been disenfranchised,” he said.

HiberGene has not responded to questions about the legal justification behind the decision or why the meetings were held virtually rather than in person.

Mr Farrell was also one of several shareholders who participated in a sale of their shares to the company earlier this year who say they have received only partial payment. Some shareholders have told The Irish Times that they have not received any payment at all.

Mr Farrell, who said he had received about 90 per cent of the money owed to him, claimed he was told by the company’s chief financial officer, Peter Kidney, that the proceeds of the share sale were being held in escrow by the company and were, as such, a matter for the liquidator.

This, Mr Farrell and others have argued, would make them creditors of the company. However, they were not listed among HiberGene’s shareholders in the statement of the company’s affairs presented at the meeting on Friday.

“I also asked for an updated share certificate,” Mr Farrell said, which has not been provided. “So I might be a shareholder or I might not be,” he said.

At the meeting of the creditors on Friday, one shareholder and former interim chief executive nominated Dublin-based insolvency expert PJ Lynch to oversee the process. This was rejected by the shareholders, who ultimately voted to appoint Mr Gaynor.