Software company Y2KTec has laid off its chairman and CEO, David Black, and is considering taking action against him after his "dereliction of duty" led the company to issue a profit warning.
Russel Roth, who has replaced Black as CEO, says although the company will still achieve a profit for the year to 28 February 2000, it will be less than the forecast after-tax profit of R5.28 million.
He says that Black, in his capacity of CEO and chairman, had the responsibility and technical knowledge with which to procure the development and release of labour law compliance software as well as the Windows version of the company`s payslip payroll software.
However, he did not supply the specifications needed to complete the software development, he says.
"Black has been retrenched and subsequently the company is investigating action that may be taken against Black arising out of his dereliction of duty," Roth adds.
The company has outsourced the completion of both the labour law product and the payslip payroll software.
Roth says these will be released next month.
"The demand for these products indicates that the company will experience a significant upturn in its profits for the financial year ending 28 February 2001," he adds.
Y2KTec was established as a holding company to acquire and develop the business of a number of interrelated IT companies and other allied businesses specialising in developing and providing software applications to business solutions.
The company had a disappointing debut on the JSE`s venture capital market in June last year, with the share price falling to a low of 22c from its 55c issue price, before closing at 42c.
Y2KTec was trading at 5c by late Tuesday morning, down from Monday`s 6c close.
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