May I again welcome you all to this the seventh annual general meeting of Hansen Technologies Limited.
Overall last year was positive for our company with a strong second half, a full year EBITDA of $5.4 million and a return to profitability. In addition we achieved considerable progress towards achieving our broader corporate objective of establishing longer term strategic relationships with market leading customers.
The encouraging performance in the second half of last year, which has continued into the new financial year, I believe validates our strategy to withdraw from the USA and focus on Australia, Europe and Japan. In these targeted markets, deregulation of the energy sector is continuing and product convergence and structural change are emerging in the telecommunications sector. These industry driven changes are creating new demand for billing solutions which offer flexibility and deliver value-added functionality. Following the achievements of the past year our confidence is growing. It is clear that our strategy of investing in HUB and of focusing on these markets is right.
The reputation of our HUB solution in the international market is growing. This was confirmed most recently in August 2006 by the decision of UK's largest retailer, Tesco, to partner with Hansen for its brand extension into telecommunications services. I am pleased to report that last month we began live billing operations for Tesco's fixed line telephone customers.
Our company now has prestigious contracts in Europe and Japan and we have maintained our leadership position in Australia.
The business of selling proprietary mission-critical software solutions drives ongoing annuity revenues. Likewise, our outsourcing and facilities management business provides a solid annuity revenue base, as well as opportunities for additional revenue from our HubFM managed billing service.
In September 2005 we recapitalised our business through a rights issue. Since then we have maintained a positive working capital position, ending the year with cash of $6.8 million, representing 4.5 cents per share. Apart from equipment leases totalling $1.1 million, we have no debt.
Substantial strategic change is taking place in our targeted energy markets. In Australia the largest energy retailer and energy network operator have recently participated in a take over action which eventually resulted in the redistribution of their respective energy interests. The energy industry regulators in Victoria are progressing with plans for the roll out of advanced metering solutions. The momentum behind the utilisation of advanced metering capability is growing on a world scale. All of these changes will drive demand for mission-critical systems capable of adapting to the new industry imperatives. This potential is understood by companies in contiguous sectors, and in the past 18 months our two most direct competitors have been bought by larger, more diverse groups.
We have achieved a lot in the past year. It has been challenging for our management and staff. I would like to thank all members of our team for their dedication and hard work as well as our shareholders for their patience and continuing support.
We also extend our thanks to Geoff Tomlinson who retired from the board to reduce his professional workload. Geoff was appointed a director in 2000 and I thank him for his substantial contribution, both as deputy chairman of the company and as chairman of the audit and remuneration committees. I am delighted that David Osborne, a director of Hansen businesses for many years prior to the public listing in 2000, agreed to join our board on 1 March. David, a chartered accountant, has been appointed as a member of the audit committee.
Our company is well positioned in this environment of strategic and industry change. We expect to report an t improvement in the financial results for the first half of this year when compared with the corresponding period last year. We are optimistic the coming year will be rewarding with interesting challenges and strong opportunities.
I will now ask our managing director, Andrew Hansen, to provide a more detailed commentary on our performance in 2006.