iCreate Limited has signed a sales agreement to acquire 100 per cent of digital outdoor advertising entity Visual Vibe and is proposing to finance the deal with funds to be earned from a rights issue to be offered in the next few weeks.

Tyrone Wilson, CEO of iCreate, told the Jamaica Observer that the rights issue will be released to the public in the next three weeks. iCreate has tapped VM Wealth as the lead arranger/broker and listing agent for the rights issue. The specifics of the value and volume of the shares to be issued in the rights issue are to be communicated at a later date. An extraordinary general meeting is to be scheduled to facilitate .

“In our last interview we spoke about iCreate becoming a creative group of companies, and this proposed acquisition of Visual Vibe is bringing us closer to that vision. It is a very strong company with years of performance under its belt and solid leadership and now it is about to be added to the iCreate roster,” Wilson outlined to the Business Observer.

He declined to say how much iCreate will be looking to raise with the rights issue or the agreed cost for Visual Vibe. However, given that iCreate can raise no more than $500 million in total equity financing as a Junior Market listed company and has already raised close to $200 million, the company could be looking to raise a little over $300 million, if it seeks to maximise the amount it can raise.

Wilson, however, said paying for the company will take a mixture of debt and equity.

If the acquisition is successful, Visual Vibe will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of iCreate to complement iCreate institute and e-commerce platform GetPaid, an entity in which iCreate acquired a majority stake earlier this year.

Visual Vibe is the largest digital outdoor advertising company in Jamaica. It was started in 2006 by businessman Ali McNab. Wilson, while declining to get into the financials of Visual Vibe, said his due diligence shows “the company has a very strong revenue stream, very strong profit and a very strong free cash flow, even through the pandemic. We are very excited about that because it will bring us to having a very solid company and help us along the way to being the GraceKennedy of creative companies in Jamaica, and help to provide strong returns to shareholders.”

There are 13 Visual Vibe boards across Jamaica in Kingston, St Catherine, St Ann, St James and Manchester.

“Visual Vibe has some very good locations in terms of billboard spaces. The big screen in the middle of Half-Way-Tree where Jamaicans gather to watch Olympics and World Championship is a Visual Vibe board. With a location like that owned by iCreate with our content creation capabilities, will give us the opportunity to use it for some unique content to engage people there and across Jamaica at the other locations. So our focus from day one will be developing a content strategy that will bring eyeballs to the screens on a consistent basis.”

Ali McNab, the founder of Visual Vibe, said he is comfortable that the business will be in good hands at the point of the completion of acquisition.

“It’s basically a question of timing. We have been discussing the possibility [of selling the company] for quite some time and having started this company some 16 years ago…we have enjoyed a good run in the business. At age 75, you start to look at other opportunities. The timing of the approach was good. It was where my head was at, looking at expansion. The business has great potential for expansion into other areas of advertising and iCreate came with some proposals that were good.”

McNab said he will remain with the company for at least one year to help in the adjustment but said plans he is considering may prevent him from going further than that.