IPH requests ASX trading halt due to cyber attack just days before paying dividend

An Australian intellectual property company has halted trading just days before it is to pay its shareholders a beefed-up dividend.

IPH has halted trading over fears it was hit with a cyber attack.

An Australian intellectual properties company has halted trading in its shares just days before it was to reward its shareholders with a 7 per cent increase on its dividend payout after it was made aware it was a victim of a cyber attack.

IPH, which deals with the provision of patent filings and trademark filings, brought trading to a standstill on Tuesday at the request of the company’s secretary, Philip Heuzenroeder.

In a letter to the Australian Securities Exchange compliance department, Mr Heuzenroeder called for all trading to be halted for at least 24 hours.

“IPH requests the trading halt to enable it to manage its continuous disclosure obligations in relation to a cyber incident that IPH has recently become aware of,” the request read.

“IPH requests that the trading halt continue until the earlier of a release of an announcement by IPH and the commencement of normal trading on Wednesday, 15 March 2023.”

The ASX’s Salvador Caldwell approved the halt, announcing securities of IPH would remain offline until Thursday unless an earlier request was made.

“Unless ASX decides otherwise, the securities will remain in trading halt until the earlier of the commencement of normal trading on Thursday, 16 March 2023 or when the announcement is released to the market,” a statement from Mr Caldwell read.

An IPH spokesman said the company was working with external cybersecurity providers to assess the breach.

“IPH and two of its member firms, Spruson & Ferguson (Australia) and Griffith Hack recently detected unauthorised access to a portion of our network,” he said.

“As soon as it was detected we took steps to secure our IT environment and are working with leading external cyber security and forensic IT advisers to support us in responding and conducting an investigation to determine precisely what occurred.”

The trading halt arrives just days before the company is due to pay a dividend of 15.5c per security to shareholders on Friday, up 7 per cent – or 1c – from the same period last year.

The dividend increase was announced at the company’s half-year results last month, in which the business recorded some strong growth compared to the first half of 2022.

Revenue in comparison was up 26 per cent to $226.9m and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation was up 30 per cent to $71.3m.

IPH has filed more 33,000 patent and 11,000 trademark across nine IP jurisdictions.

The business hires more than 1200 staff and says it services a number of Fortune Global 500 companies, multinationals, public sector research organisations and professional services firms across 25 countries.