Filofax swallows Danish rival: Pounds 910,000 purchase completes tally of European customers

FILOFAX, maker of the Eighties stationery status symbol, has expanded its Continental operation with the purchase of a Danish counterpart, Systemplan, for pounds 910,000, writes Robert Cole.

Robin Field, chief executive, said that before the purchase Filofax had sold its ring-bound diary-cum-address-books in all European states except Denmark.

Systemplan had annual sales of pounds 1.1m and net assets of pounds 380,000. Mr Field said it made profits, but did not give details. However, he said he hoped Systemplan would quickly achieve 15 per cent operating profits, in line with other parts of the Filofax business.

Filofax fell into loss in 1989 and 1990 but - helped by a rights issue backed by Peter Earl, the Planet Hollywood impresario - it paid off debt and appointed a new management team.

Mr Field said Filofax now sold 600,000 personal organisers a year compared with 200,000 in 1987.

UBS, the broker, thinks Filofax will make taxable profits of pounds 2.7m for the 12 months to next March. The shares, quoted on the Unlisted Securities Market, rose 2p to 147p.

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