DX Group shares plunge after corporate espionage legal claim
Shares in the courier firm tumbled as much as 11% after it confirmed that Tuffnells Parcels Express submitted a claim in the High Court on Friday.
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Courier firm DX Group has seen its shares plunge after confirming that a legal claim has been lodged against it by a rival logistics company, accusing it of alleged corporate espionage.
Shares in DX tumbled as much as 11% on Monday morning after it said that Tuffnells Parcels Express submitted the claim in the High Court on Friday “in relation to confidential competitor information being obtained by DX in the past”.
It follows a report in the Sunday Times detailing allegations by Sheffield-based logistics firm Tuffnells that some DX Group staff, who were former employees of Tuffnells, had conspired to obtain daily customer service reports.
DX Group said: “Matters referred to in the claim were subject to a corporate governance inquiry and investigation by DX, the conclusions of which were reported by the company in an announcement made on 20 September 2022.
The group intends to defend its position robustly
“The group intends to defend its position robustly and will respond to the claim in due course.”
DX said last September that the internal investigation found that confidential competitor information was obtained and that “an isolated offer of payment… for such information had been made by employees”.
It concluded at the time that there may have been a breach of the Bribery Act 2012 by the employees concerned and that it had taken further disciplinary action with certain staff involved in the case and also improved management training and protocols.
DX’s former auditor, Grant Thornton, resigned in February last year because of what it claimed were “actual or potential breaches of law and/or regulations by the company”, as well as “the performance of the investigation and subsequent corporate governance inquiry” and “provision of inaccurate information, which in Grant Thornton’s view did not give a full picture of the scale and seriousness of the facts”.
DX – which handles parcel freight, secure courier and logistics services – said at the time that it “does not consider that the reasons provided by Grant Thornton accurately reflect the current situation”.
It saw its shares temporarily suspended from the Aim market in January last year after failing to publish its annual report on time, while former chief executive Lloyd Dunn resigned abruptly in September 2022.
The group only recently appointed his replacement, hiring Paul Ibbetson, managing director of DX Freight, as chief executive on January 31.
Mr Ibbetson previously worked at Tuffnells, where he was a board director for eight years.