TechInvest News

Automic now boasts largest number of ASX-listed registry clients following key acquisition

Written by Staff Writers | Mar 8, 2024 2:11:20 AM

Registry and professional services provider, Automic Group, has become the leading registry provider in
Australia with 750 of the 2300 trading companies on the ASX, after the transition of 180 companies from
Advanced Share Registry Limited, which it acquired via a Scheme of Arrangement in December 2023.

Automic transitioned, in one weekend, the registry services for180 listed and unlisted entities, containing
1.6 million shareholdings and more than 10 million transactions - with no impact to end users or system
performance.

The transition, one of the largest ever performed in Australia, now gives these companies and their shareholders
access to the most advanced proprietary registry platform in Australia with a full range of related capital
markets and investor-related services. 

These services are provided via the only cloud-native and API-enabled offering of scale that delivers both share registry and employee share plans on a single platform.

Automic is also the leading IPO registry provider in Australia, winning 55 per cent of IPOs in 2022-23, number one in registry transitions, with about 70 per cent of listed registry transitions between 2021 and 2023 and manages professional services to a further 650 funds and private unlisted companies.

Automic Group CEO, Andrew Wilson, said that Automic has been able to claim the top spot from legacy Australian share registries after only eight years in operation, because of its ability to make it easier for companies to manage their registers while providing their investors with a more modern and intuitive user experience they have come to expect. At the same time, Automic’s modern technology helps companies more effectively keep up with the evolving regulatory landscape in a system that offers the highest levels of cyber security available.

“We saw that ASX-listed businesses found that older system structures inherently made it increasingly difficult to meet their governance and security requirements in the face of accelerating regulation change, ever-increasing cybersecurity threats and rapidly evolving investor service expectations.

“Automic was never hamstrung by legacy technology systems, as we designed and created Australia’s first and only cloud-native and API-enabled single registry platform of scale. This modern architecture enhances data management quality, user experience, performance and security and allows us to implement improvements quickly. As a result, it provides industry-leading client company service, shareholder experience and employee share plans with all the advanced services in the one platform under one log-in.”

According to Atomic, it is this platform structure that enables it to meet another essential need around security, providing industry-leading security with all data hosted in AWS data centres and encrypted in transit and at rest and an industry-leading 99.99% uptime across all components.

“Our data centres are in clusters across distinct physical locations with redundant architectures guaranteeing high availability. Our dynamic cybersecurity strategy blends a strict adherence to ISO 27001 controls with a robust array of advanced technical measures and continuous security enhancements, providing its clients with better capabilities to adhere to proper governance,” said Mr Wilson.

The Automic platform has also ridden the trend for more efficient shareholder register management and analytics and a suite of company and governance-related services that allow public companies, unlisted clients and fund managers to manage their relationships more effectively with key stakeholder groups – shareholders, employees and capital markets.

“This includes having one of the industry’s most efficient Company Secretary and client company user platforms with fully integrated cap tables to facilitate efficient management of issued capital, automated calculation of placement capacity, real time extraction of data and tracking and alerting of director, interested parties or watch listed trades, and automated ASX appendices.”

“Businesses now need to navigate the market more effectively than they used to due to an ongoing volatile environment and evolving stakeholder needs. So, we are the only registry in the market with a holistic and actively involved capital market consultancy to help our clients build better relationships with their stakeholders during challenging times. These services include fund registry, analytics, employee share plans, investor services, corporate actions, CFO advisory, company secretarial, ESG, investor relations, communications, and media relations,” Mr Wilson added.