NEW YORK, Dec. 02, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C., a nationally recognized shareholder rights law firm, reminds investors that class actions have been commenced on behalf of stockholders of Vintage Wine Estates, Inc. (NASDAQ: VWE), SolarEdge, Inc. (NASDAQ: SEDG), Unisys Corporation (NYSE: UIS), and Rent the Runway, Inc. (NASDAQ: RENT). Stockholders have until the deadlines below to petition the court to serve as lead plaintiff. Additional information about each case can be found at the link provided.
Vintage Wine Estates, Inc. (NASDAQ: VWE)
Class Period: October 13, 2021 - September 13, 2022
Lead Plaintiff Deadline: January 13, 2023
Vintage Wine is a vintner company that sells wines and spirits.
On September 13, 2022, Vintage Wine announced its financial results for fiscal year 2022. In its press release, the Company stated that it “recorded $19.1 million in non-cash inventory adjustments identified through efforts t[o] improve and strengthen inventory management, processes and reporting.” The Company also stated that “the [fourth] quarter included approximately $6.8 million in overhead burden that was related to the first and second quarter of fiscal 2022, but not material to the respective periods.”
On this news, the Company’s share price fell $2.23, or 40.3%, to close at $3.30 per share on September 14, 2022, on unusually high trading volume.
Throughout the Class Period, Defendants made materially false and/or misleading statements, as well as failed to disclose material adverse facts about the Company’s business, operations, and prospects. Specifically, Defendants failed to disclose to investors: (1) that, due to a material weakness related to its inventory controls and procedures, the Company lacked a reasonable basis to report inventory metrics; (2) that the Company understated its overhead burden in certain quarters, thereby overstating its adjusted EBITDA; (3) that, as a result of the foregoing, Vintage Wine was reasonably likely to incur significant charges to restate prior reporting; and (4) that, as a result of the foregoing, Defendant’s positive statements about the Company’s business, operations, and prospects were materially misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis.
For more information on the Vintage Wine class action go to: https://bespc.com/cases/VWE
SolarEdge, Inc. (NASDAQ: SEDG)
SolarEdge is incorporated in the state of Delaware and its principle executive offices are located at 700 Tasman Dr., Milpitas, California 95035. SolarEdge provides solar power optimization and photovoltaic (“PV”) monitoring solutions for solar energy systems, offering optimizers, inverters, monitoring equipment, tools, and accessories for power harvesting, conversion, and efficiency while serving customers worldwide. Two main parts of SolarEdge’s solar energy systems are its power optimizers and inverters. A power optimizer can be described as a direct current to direct current (“DC to DC”) converter technology developed to maximize the energy harvest from solar PV systems. An inverter, also referred to as the “brains” of a solar energy system, converts the DC power (or “raw” energy) from the PV modules into alternating current (“AC”) power (or “usable” energy) that runs in a user’s home.
SolarEdge readily admits that inverters have “critical” importance because while inverters account for less than 10% of system cost, those components manage 100% of system production and are “critical for the long term financial performance of a PV system as it can maximize energy production and reduce lifetime costs.” Since SolarEdge started commercialized shipments of solar energy systems in 2010, over 3.7 million inverters and 89 million power optimizers were shipped worldwide.
Throughout the Class Period, Defendants made materially false and misleading statements, and failed to disclose material adverse facts about the Company’s business, operational, and compliance policies. Specifically, Defendants made false and/or misleading statements and failed to disclose to investors that: (i) the designs of the power optimizers, inverters, and components thereof used to develop SolarEdge’s products potentially originated with and were misappropriated from Ampt LLC (“Ampt”), a competitor in the renewable energy industry; (ii) Ampt made claims against the Company for misappropriating Ampt’s patented technology, (iii) evidentiary support existed for the allegations that SolarEdge misappropriated certain patents relating to the design and development of the Company’s power optimizers and inverters; (iv) as a result, SolarEdge faced a threat of regulatory and/or court action, which could prohibit the import, marketing, and sale of its power optimizers and inverters, including solar energy systems that contain such products; which in turn (v) seriously threatened SolarEdge’s ability to monetize on their solar energy systems that contain the power optimizers and inverters in the United States and generate revenue; and (vi) certain revenues generated from the sale of power optimizers and inverters were potentially based on SolarEdge’s unlawful activities, including the misappropriation of patented designs by Ampt.
The investing public learned of this alleged patent infringement on July 28, 2022 when the U.S. International Trade Commission (“ITC”) agreed to review a patent infringement case filed by Ampt against SolarEdge on July 28, 2022. The news of the ITC’s vote to institute an investigation of SolarEdge on August 29, 2022 caused a precipitous and immediate decline in the price of SolarEdge shares. While SolarEdge’s stock price opened at $284.23 on August 29, 2022, the news of ITC’s vote resulted in SolarEdge’s stock price to fall approximately 1.4% to close at $279.46 on August 29, 2022. This news caused SolarEdge to lose market capitalization of $265 million on August 29, 2022.
But the bad news were far from over. On October 19, 2022, investors learned the gravity of the ITC’s investigation when Judge Connolly in the District Court of Delaware stayed a parallel proceeding filed against SolarEdge by Ampt and based on substantially similar allegations, styled Ampt, LLC v. SolarEdge Tech., Inc., No. 1:22-cv-00997 (D. Del.) (“Delaware Proceeding”) pending the ITC’s investigation. On this news, shares of SolarEdge stock fell 2.3% to close at $199.46 on October 19, 2022.
As a result of SolarEdge’s wrongful acts and omissions, and the precipitous decline in the market value of SolarEdge’s common shares, Plaintiff and other Class members have suffered significant losses and damages.
For more information on the SolarEdge investigation go to: https://bespc.com/cases/SEDG
Unisys Corporation (NYSE: UIS)
On November 8, 2022, Unisys disclosed that it would not be able to timely file its third quarter 2022 financial results due to an internal investigation regarding “certain disclosure controls and procedures matters, including, but not limited to, the dissemination and communication of information within certain parts of the organization.” The Company stated that it expects that the results of the investigation may determine that there are “one or more material weaknesses” in its internal control over financial reporting.
On this news, the Company’s stock fell as much as 49% during intraday trading on November 8, 2022, thereby injuring investors.
For more information on the Unisys investigation go to: https://bespc.com/cases/UIS
Rent the Runway, Inc. (NASDAQ: RENT)
Class Period: pursuant to the company’s October 2021 IPO
Lead Plaintiff Deadline: January 13, 2023
RTR is an e-commerce platform that allows users to rent, subscribe, or buy designer apparel and accessories. RTR offers high-end apparel such as evening wear and accessories, as well as more causal and mixed-use items such as ready-to-wear, workwear, denim, maternity, outerwear, blouses, knitwear, loungewear, jewelry, handbags, activewear, ski wear, home goods, and kidswear. RTR sources its products from over 750 luxury brand partners.
Customers can access RTR’s designer inventory in several ways. RTR gives customers ongoing access to its “unlimited closet” through its subscription offerings or the ability to rent a-la-carte through its “reserve offerings.” Subscribers and customers also have the ability to buy RTR products through its “resale offering.” In the first six months of 2021, subscription revenue represented 83% of RTR’s total revenue, reserve rental revenue represented 7.6% of RTR’s total revenue, and resale revenue represented 9.4% of RTR’s total revenue.
RTR’s business was severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, which began in March 2020. As a luxury clothing provider, RTR’s sales and services suffered from stay-athome orders and the decline in opportunities for social gatherings among its customer base. Between its fiscal 2019 and 2020, RTR’s revenues declined nearly 40% to $157.5 million and its total active subscribers declined nearly 60% to 54,797 active subscribers.1
In the months leading up to the IPO, RTR claimed that it was experiencing a business resurgence as concerns about the COVID-19 pandemic lessened, lockdown orders ceased, and its customers engaged in more social outings. For example, the Company stated that it had grown to 111,732 active subscribers as of September 30, 2021, representing 104% growth since the beginning of fiscal year 2021. Similarly, the Registration Statement stated that during RTR’s second quarter of 2021 (the quarter immediately prior to the IPO) quarterly revenues had grown to $46.7 million, representing 62% growth year-over-year.
On October 4, 2021, the Company filed with the SEC a registration statement on Form S-1 for the IPO, which, after several amendments, was declared effective on October 26, 2021 (the “Registration Statement”). On October 27, 2021, the Company filed with the SEC a prospectus for the IPO on Form 424B4, which incorporated and formed part of the Registration Statement (the “Prospectus”). The Registration Statement and Prospectus were used to sell to the investing public 17 million shares of RTR Class A common stock at $21 per share for $357 million in gross offering proceeds, which was used in substantial part to pay back debt from certain of the Company’s private equity backers.
For more information on the Rent the Runway class action go to: https://bespc.com/cases/RENT
About Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C.:
Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. is a nationally recognized law firm with offices in New York, California, and South Carolina. The firm represents individual and institutional investors in commercial, securities, derivative, and other complex litigation in state and federal courts across the country. For more information about the firm, please visit www.bespc.com. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.
Contact Information:
Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C.
Brandon Walker, Esq.
Melissa Fortunato, Esq.
(212) 355-4648
investigations@bespc.com
www.bespc.com
