Ocean Harvest Technology Group PLC on Tuesday said its half-year loss widened despite increased revenue, but it reported ‘strong momentum’ and said its outlook remained strong.

Shares in the Theale, England-headquartered company were down 14% at 12.19 pence in London on Tuesday. The stock was priced at 16p in its initial public offering at the start of April.

Ocean Harvest produces seaweed-based ingredients for animal feed. Its pretax loss for the first half of 2023 was €2.2 million compared with €1.3 million the year before. Loss before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation remained broadly flat unchanged at €1.2 million.

Overall revenue increased 42% to €1.8 million from €1.2 million. Product revenue surged by 66% to €1.6 million from €952,000.

‘At our maiden set of interim results, I am pleased to say that OHT has begun to deliver on its objectives set out at its IPO in April,’ said Chief Executive Officer Mark Williams.

The cost of goods sold increased 19% to €1.2 million. Overheads - excluding initial public offering costs, share-based payments, depreciation and finance costs - increased 24% to €1.9 million.

Ocean Harvest said the increased product revenue was driven by new customer acquisitions and an increase in average selling prices. It ‘onboarded over ten new customers’ during the period, including a US ‘top five swine producer’ and ‘one of the UK’s largest feed pre-mixers’.

The company also expanded its seaweed supply chain ‘in new regions such as East Africa and the Philippines, giving access to materially larger volumes of biomass.’

Looking ahead, Ocean Harvest said it has ‘strong momentum’ and continues to acquire new customers, although it has experienced delays in Europe due to ingredient prices affecting customers’ profitability. It expects total revenue in excess of €3.4 million for the whole of 2023.

CEO Williams commented: ‘We are continuing to strengthen our global sales team and build out our supply chain. We will also continue to invest in [research and development] to innovate and enhance our existing customer offering in the markets the group operates in.

‘We will continue to manage some of the short term onboarding delays and we look forward to delivering on our long term growth strategy for our new and existing shareholders.’

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