Lernout & Hauspie Announces Filing for Reorganization Protection; Company Will Continue Operating and Remain Focused On Rebuilding Its Asset Base.Business/Technology Editors IEPER, Belgium & BURLINGTON, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 29, 2000 Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products NV (NASDAQ NASDAQ in full National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations U.S. market for over-the-counter securities. Established in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), NASDAQ is an automated quotation system that reports on : LHSP LHSP List Hosting Service Provider LHSP Left Handed Starting Pitcher , EASDAQ See European Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotation. : LHSP) (`L&H' or `the Company'), a world leader in speech and language technology, products and services, today announced that it has voluntarily filed a Chapter 11 petition for reorganization protection under the U.S. bankruptcy code Bankruptcy Code may refer to:
The chapter 11 filing, made today in Wilmington, Delaware Wilmington is the largest city in the state of Delaware and is located at the confluence of the Christina River and Brandywine Creek, near where the Christina flows into the Delaware River. , will enable L&H to continue addressing its past problems, while developing a new strategic plan to leverage the Company's unparalleled base of technology assets and market access, as well as restore profitability. In addition to the filing, L&H is in active negotiations to obtain debtor-in-possession financing Debtor-in-possession financing New debt obtained by a firm during the Chapter 11 bankruptcy process, Federal Bankruptcy Rule 4001 (c)(1). This financing is unique because it is secured, that is, it has priority over existing debt, equity and other claims. . John Duerden, President and Chief Executive Officer of L&H, said: "We have tried, without success, to reach an acceptable accommodation with our bank lenders. After an intensive analysis of L&H's world-wide business operations Business operations are those activities involved in the running of a business for the purpose of producing value for the stakeholders. Compare business processes. The outcome of business operations is the harvesting of value from assets and a careful assessment of its financial position, we concluded that a voluntary reorganization filing is both prudent and necessary to preserve and rebuild our valuable customer base and technology assets." Daniel Hart, General Counsel of L&H explained that, "an important factor in the decision to seek reorganization protection was the recent discovery of a very significant cash shortfall on the balance sheet of the Korean subsidiary, the circumstances of which we will vigorously investigate with the assistance of external resources." Mr. Duerden expressed confidence that this was the right decision for the company at this time: "This court-supervised process will enable us to focus on realizing the enormous commercial potential of L&H's considerable technology resources, while continuing to investigate and remediate problems emanating from the past." Roel Pieper Roland ("Roel") Pieper (1956 - ) is a Dutch IT-entrepreneur. Pieper was born in Vlaardingen, son of an engineer at a car manufacturer. His father died when Pieper was 20, and on his 18th birthday he was subject to a motoring accident which destroyed his sporting career as a player , Chairman of the Board, said, "Despite L&H's financial situation, we remain a market and technology leader, which gives us a strong foundation on which to build a new and profitable company. With this reorganization we now have the opportunity to chart a new course for L&H." In the US, the filing was made by Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products NV, Dictaphone Corporation, and L&H Holdings USA, Inc., the successor corporation to Dragon Systems Inc., for reorganization under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code. In Belgium, a concordaat reorganization filing will be made by Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products NV. About Lernout & Hauspie Lernout & Hauspie (L&H) is a global leader in advanced speech and language solutions for vertical markets, computers, automobiles, telecommunications, embedded products, consumer goods consumer goods Any tangible commodity purchased by households to satisfy their wants and needs. Consumer goods may be durable or nondurable. Durable goods (e.g., autos, furniture, and appliances) have a significant life span, often defined as three years or more, and and the Internet. The company is making the speech user interface (SUI Sui (swā), dynasty of China that ruled from 581 to 618. This short-lived dynasty reunified China in 589 after 400 years of division and laid the foundation for further consolidation under the T'ang dynasty. ) the keystone of simple, convenient interaction between humans and technology, and is using advanced translation technology to break down language barriers. The company provides a wide range of offerings, including: customized solutions for corporations; core speech technologies marketed to OEMs; end user and retail applications for continuous speech products in horizontal and vertical markets; and document creation, human and machine translation services, Internet translation offerings, and linguistic tools. L&H's products and services originate in four basic areas: automatic speech recognition (ASR (Automatic Speech Recognition) Using voice recognition to replace keypad entry for telephone voice menus. Typically used to speak the digits 0 through 9 insted of keying them, ASR systems may be able to recognize a limited vocabulary. See voice recognition and AVSR. ), text-to-speech (TTS (1) See text-to-speech. (2) (Transaction Tracking System) Software that monitors a transaction until completion. In the event of a hardware or software failure, it ensures that the database is brought back to its former state before the attempt to ), digital speech and music compression (SMC SMC Saint Mary's College SMC Santa Monica College SMC Solaris Management Console SMC Smooth Muscle Cell SMC Small Magellanic Cloud (also see LMC) SMC Safety Management Certificate (maritime shipping) ) and text-to-text (translation). For more information, please visit Lernout & Hauspie on the World Wide Web at www.lhsl.com. This Press Release contains forward-looking information that involves risks and uncertainties, including statements about the company's plans, objectives, expectations and intentions. Readers are cautioned that forward looking statements include known and unknown risks, including uncertainty of new product development, the risk that newly introduced products may contain undetected errors or defects or otherwise not perform as anticipated, early state of development of the speech, language and medical information technology markets, the ability of L&H's customers to successfully integrate and commercialise L&H's technology, the company's ability to successfully integrate the operations of Dictaphone and Dragon, the retention of key technical and other personnel, risks associated with the financial leverage associated with the company's assumption and/or repayment of Dictaphone indebtedness, currency and other risks related to international operations, rapid technological change and intense competition, as well as other risks set forth in L&H's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-looking statements contained herein speak only as of the date of this Press Release. L&H is a trademark of Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products N.V. in the United States and/or other countries. All other product names or trademarks referenced herein are trademarks of their respective owners. |
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