Antilles Oil & Gas to become ‘HomeStay Care’ as it moves into aged care technology
HomeStay Care offers disruptive technology for the aged care industry to enable individuals to “stay in their own homes longer”.
After searching for more than a year for a new direction, Antilles Oil & Gas (ASX: AVD) has moved its focus to aged care technology and is planning a change of name.
The company lifted a trading halt this morning to announce it has exercised its option to acquire 100% of the issued capital of HomeStay Care Pty Ltd, including one Australian and two Singapore-based subsidiaries.
The HomeStay group of companies provide technology to the aged care industry, assisting seniors to live independently in their homes for a longer period of time.
With this new focus, Antilles plans to be renamed HomeStay Care Limited on completion of the acquisition.
The news follows an announcement Antilles made in May, stating it had signed a binding term sheet granting it the option to acquire the group.
Antilles considers the acquisition to be an “exciting opportunity”, given the recently released Federal Budget includes A$1.6 billion over four years to support 14,000 additional high level home care packages, which would allow more older Australians to receive care at home and avoid the need to go into residential care. This adds to the 6000 places the government had provided since the last Federal Budget.
Aged care technology platform
HomeStay has set up an app that incorporates three offerings: Aged Care On Demand Services, HealthCare data management and Intelligent Home.
Aged Care On Demand Services allows clients, family and vendors to search, book, schedule and pay for “everyday” services such as cleaning, gardening, meal preparation, handy man, laundry and transportation. This booking system can also offer clinical services via third party suppliers such as Allied Health Service providers.
HealthCare data management is an online health portal that allows users to store personal medical records and upcoming appointments. Doctors are able to upload test results and send secure messages to enable discussions with the patient remaining in the comfort of their home.
The portal also enables connections to wearable devices that can monitor things like activity, sleep patterns, blood pressure, blood sugar and heart rate.
In addition, the health data collected will be used to develop artificial intelligence alerts to notify families (via the HomeStay app) on patterns that do not align with a user’s daily activity, such as picking up on an abnormal heartbeat or failure to move for an extended period of time.
The Intelligent Home platform integrates AI sensors including movement monitoring, bed sensors, hot water sensors and incontinence devices. Data is collected wirelessly through a hub that alerts family or caregivers to a potential incident so it can be immediately attended to. Actions include calling an ambulance in the case of an emergency or scheduling a caregiver to attend non-urgent matters.
The HomeStay app is free to download, with revenue being generated from a subscription service to Intelligent Homes and by charging a fee (15% of the total cost) from the vendors providing the on-demand services.
According to Antilles, the company plans to grow its business by converting existing commercial pilots to long-term commercial contracts and cross-selling its on-demand services platform.
“HomeStay has focused its operations in NSW and targets expansion to a national platform and is also commencing commercial operations in Singapore,” the company stated.
“HomeStay continues to engage with potential private and government partners to undertake further commercial projects and continue to develop and expand its offerings under the three core areas”.
Change of focus
Antilles was originally involved in oil and gas exploration, with a targeted focus on large scale resources in the Carribean, Southern and Central Americas.
In April 2017, the company announced it had terminated its farm-out agreement for an onshore block in Peru due to being unsuccessful at obtaining 100% interest in the operation of the area.
For more than a year, Antilles said it was “proactively working to identify and review other new projects or asset acquisition opportunities, both within the resources sector and other sectors”.
The company still has a number of subsidiaries associated with oil and gas acreage in the Midland Basin of Texas, US. However, it said these were currently “in the process of being wound up and the company therefore does not consider them relevant to the company’s ongoing activities following the completion of the acquisition”.
New look
As well the planned name change, the company will undergo a board change, with two directors resigning and new directors being appointed.
As the HomeStay acquisition will significantly change the nature and scale of the company’s current activities, Antilles will be required to obtain approval from its shareholders and re-comply with some ASX listing rules on completion of the transaction.
To assist with this, as well as to support its proposed international roll-out strategy, the company is planning to conduct a capital raising to raise up to A$4 million through the issue of fully paid shares at a price of A$0.02 per share.
Antilles shares surged 71% to A$0.036 on this morning’s announcement. By early afternoon trade, the share price was sitting up 47.62% to A$0.031.