The share price of SkinBioTherapeutics plc has crashed after its former CEO was accused of misrepresenting results by the company’s board.
Stuart Ashman, who joined in 2024, was briefly suspended by the listed Newcastle firm last week and he resigned soon afterwards.
SkinBioTherapeutics said on Friday that it was investigating Ashman over ‘matters relating to his conduct’.
This morning it said new information had given the board ‘reason to believe that the former CEO has misrepresented material information to the board and senior management, the company’s auditors and advisors’.
Specifically, he is accused of inflating accrued royalty income recorded in the audited accounts for the year ended 30th June 2025.
This amounted to £770,000 and is now expected to be removed from the FY25 accounts, subject to confirmation by auditors, when they are restated.
FY25 revenue will become £3.87 million from the reported figure of £4.64m, while adjusted EBITDA for FY25 will be restated to a loss of £1.17m from the reported loss figure of £410,000, with an operating loss of £1.47m.
The board now anticipates that the results for the year ended 30 June 2026 will be significantly below current market expectations, it added.
“The former CEO was informed of these allegations on Sunday 15th February 2026 and the board investigation is continuing,” SkinBioTherapeutics stated in a notice to the London Stock Exchange.
“Whilst the board believes this is an isolated incident, nevertheless, it has instigated a broader investigation to review all of the group’s businesses with respect to financial reporting and operations.”
The life science HealthTech, which is focused on skin heath, said non-executive chair Martin Hunt will temporarily become executive chair while a search for an interim replacement then permanent CEO takes place.
It said that it remains confident in the underlying financial health of the business due to its robust cash position – £2.92m as at 13 February 2026 – while contracts held with key partners and customers ‘remain sound’.
However 47% was wiped off its share price on Monday, leaving it 67% down over the last five days.
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Ashman was appointed in 2024, succeeding Professor Cath O’Neill, with over two decades of commercial healthcare experience – primarily in the medical devices industry.
Since 2014, he had served as CEO of Onbone, a Finnish private equity-backed medical device company. Prior to that, Ashman was president and CEO of Andover Healthcare, a US-based wound management manufacturer and president and CEO of TI Group, a UK-based medical/engineering company.
Last year the company welcomed a new COO and board member in Simon Hewitson, a former CEO of Polar Krush Group.
Emily Bertram was also appointed as the group’s finance director in a non-board capacity following the departure of Manprit Randhawa.
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