Horizon and Wimba Complete Merger and Mr. Tommaso Trionfi becomes CEO of HorizonWimba
Horizon Wimba also Announced Completion of a $1.875 million Private Placement of Shares of Preferred Stock
Horizon Wimba also Announced an Agreement to Merge with Continuum Group B, a Public Reporting Company, under the Exchange Act of 1934
New York, NY, U.S.A. / Sophia Antipolis, France – (Monday, June 14, 2004) – HorizonLive.com, Inc., a U.S. company and a leading provider of virtual classrooms and real-time collaboration software to higher education, and Wimba S.A., a French company and a leading provider of web-based voice collaboration tools to higher education, jointly announced today the completion of their business combination, previously announced April 7, 2004.
Effective as of the closing of the transaction, the corporate name of the combined companies has been changed to Horizon Wimba, Inc. (“Horizon Wimba”) and Mr. Tommaso Trionfi, former CEO of Wimba S.A., has become the CEO of Horizon Wimba, while Mr. Walter H. Barandiaran, former CEO of HorizonLive.com, Inc., has become the Chairman of Horizon Wimba.
Horizon Wimba also announced that it has concurrently completed a private placement of shares of its Class A 5% Convertible Redeemable Preferred Stock for an aggregate purchase price of $1.875 million. The primary investors in the Class A Preferred were current institutional shareholders of HorizonLive and Wimba.
Horizon Wimba also announced that it has entered into an Agreement and Plan of Reorganization (the “Plan of Reorganization”) with Continuum Group B, Inc., a Nevada corporation and a reporting company under the Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (“Group B”). Pursuant to the Plan of Reorganization, a subsidiary of Group B will be merged into Horizon Wimba and Horizon Wimba will become the surviving company. Following completion of the Plan of Reorganization and subject to a vote of Group B’s shareholders, it is expected that Group B’s (i) name will be changed to Horizon Wimba, Inc., (ii) state of incorporation will be changed from Nevada to Delaware, and (iii) shares of common stock will trade in the OTC Bulletin Board. Completion of the Plan of Reorganization is subject to customary closing conditions.
Tommaso Trionfi, CEO of Horizon Wimba commented: “Worldwide adoption of web-based technologies to deliver educational services continues to accelerate. We believe Horizon Wimba is well positioned to benefit from these trends.” Mr. Trionfi added, “Our strategy going forward is to compete effectively based on the quality of our solutions, expertise of our team, and strength of our global partners, leveraging our combined knowledge of and single focus commitment to the education industry.”
Walter Barandiaran, Chairman of Horizon Wimba commented: “Financial staying power is a key strategic asset for Horizon Wimba, which, as a growing company, it must always strive to maintain and further develop.” Mr. Barandiaran added, “The primary reason for our combination with Group B, a public reporting company, is that we expect it to help provide us with the financial flexibility needed to realize our goals developing within this emerging market.”
About Horizon Wimba
Horizon Wimba develops web-based collaboration software for online distance education, language learning and live interactive communications. Our collaborative learning applications enable instructors and students to fully embrace the new wave of pedagogical opportunities afforded by campus-wide networks and the internet; regardless of geographic location, bandwidth or operating system. Our virtual rooms enable instructors to conduct live, online classes, meetings, office hours and study groups, and our vocal collaboration technologies add oral content directly into course content, webpages and assessments. Horizon Wimba adds new dimensions to online, accessible education, personalizing and humanizing the online learning experience for all.