If you visit the websites of BritainsDNA, ScotlandsDNA and the other associated websites (IrelandsDNA, CymruDNAWales, YorkshiresDNA, IzzardsDNA) you are now greeted with an error message. Here's the message as it appears in Google Chrome after clicking on the Advanced button.
It therefore looks as though Source BioScience, the new owners, are in the process of rebranding the various BritainsDNA websites. There is also a newly created MyDNA Global Facebook page and Twitter account.
There is no change in the product offerings but the websites have been pared down. There is no longer a list of employees and the events page has disappeared. The legal verbiage on all the sites now appears in the name of MyDNA Global.
I've spoken to a couple of people who have tested at BritainsDNA but so far no one has had any communication from the company informing them of the changes.
Source BioScience have now published their annual report for the year ending on 31 December 2015. which provides further information about the acquisition. Here is a quote from page 17:
In December the Group acquired BritainsDNA, a provider of DNA-based ancestry and genealogy products to the consumer market. Source BioScience has been providing the laboratory testing and analysis for BritainsDNA for a number of years. The acquisition will deliver incremental revenue and increased operational efficiency for this business. The commercial activities will be migrated across to the Group’s e-commerce platform and e-Shop early in 2016.The financial details of the acquisition are given on page 77. It would appear that the Moffat Partnership, the parent company of BritainsDNA (now renamed as Source BioScience Scotland) had considerable financial liabilities amounting to £570,000 but little in the way of tangible and intangible assets. These liabilities appear to have been offset by a goodwill valuation of £584,000.
There have not been any announcements from Source BioScience about their future plans for BritainsDNA/MyDNA Global so it will be interesting to see what happens in the coming months. If anyone has any further information do let me know.
Thanks for the update Debbie. I logged into my results at ScotlandsDNA a few days ago. Locating them was not intuitive. Kept getting directed to sales. I didn't notice anything updated in my Chromo2 results.
ReplyDeleteThanks Dave. I don't think your results are likely to be updated. I'm just a bit surprised that they don't seem to have informed their customers of the change of ownership and the change of name.
ReplyDeleteA couple of comments Debbie.
ReplyDelete"Good will" is not a tangible asset and is ephemeral; it has no objective monetary value. It often appears on balance sheets because double-entry bookkeeping requires equal credits and debits for every transaction; and, assets must equal liabilities. It's a financial problem signal when good will comprises a sizable fraction of assets. It means that money didn't go into more tangible assets or revenue production.
The "error messages" are probably your software warning you that the sites' expected security certificates have expired or been pulled. (The warnings are a good thing.) Apparently, My DNA Global hasn't got around to making redirects to their new site.
Ralph, Thanks for the explanation about goodwill. I think the error messages are coming up because the security certificates are now in the name of MyDNA Global but they don't seem to have fixed the redirects.
ReplyDelete