At the meeting, shareholders elected the following former directors Paul Howell, Loudon Owen, Thomas Pladsen, and a new director Paul Fornazzari.
Mr. Fornazzari is a partner in Gowlings' Toronto office and the national leader of Gowlings' Corporate Finance, Securities and Public M&A Group. He practices corporate and securities law with an emphasis on mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance and regulatory matters. Mr. Fornazzari has acted for domestic and foreign clients in various industries, including mining, petroleum, technology and financial services. Mr. Fornazzari earned his law degree at the University of Windsor and was called to the Ontario BAR in 1996 and completed an LLM degree in securities law at Osgoode Hall Law School in 2002.
The first order of business for the new Board of HDX was to elect a new Chairman to replace John McBride. After serving HDX as interim CEO from June 2006 to Nov 2006 and as director and Chairman of the Board since June 2006, Mr. McBride advised HDX that he would not be putting his name forward for re election for 2009 in order to focus on his other business interests. Mr. McBride remains a significant shareholder. The management and Board of Directors thanked Mr. McBride for his important contribution and wished him well.
Loudon Owen was unanimously elected by the new Board to act as Chairman. Mr. Owen has also served as a director for the past three years. Mr. Owen is co-founder and managing director of McLean Watson Capital. Prior to establishing McLean Watson Capital, Mr. Owen was a co-investor and advisor to SOFTIMAGE Inc., a world leader in high-end 3D animation, in its initial public offering on NASDAQ in 1992 and its sale to Microsoft in 1994. Mr. Owen served as the joint-COO for SOFTIMAGE Inc. from 1993 to its sale. Prior to that, Mr. Owen practiced corporate/commercial and securities law with a major Canadian law firm, concentrating on M&A and technology financing. He subsequently founded a corporate law firm that specialized in representing growth companies. Mr. Owen currently serves on the boards of directors of Infrastructures for Information Inc., Vismand Exploration Inc., Amplus Communication Pte Ltd., Ntegrator Pte Ltd., a reporting issuer in Singapore, Quantec Geoscience Limited and Echelon Capital Corporation, a reporting issuer in Alberta, British Columbia and Ontario. Mr. Owen has served on the boards of directors of a range of public companies, including BPI Mutual Funds, Brookfield/BF Realty and SOFTIMAGE Inc. Mr. Owen holds a BA from the University of Toronto, an LLB from Osgoode Hall Law School, Toronto and an MBA from INSEAD in Fontainebleau, France.
During the AGM, President and CEO Paul Howell repeated HDX's intention to pursue growth both organically and through future acquisitions, indicating HDX's continuing evaluation of potential targets. Mr. Howell also commented that HDX experienced a difficult 4th quarter in 2008 in light of the economic meltdown. However he stated HDX had record 1st quarter sales revenue and that he was optimistic that the 2nd quarter would be a record quarter for sales revenue and that it would be a profitable quarter.
Mr. Howell stated further that the HDX team continued to grow during the 1st quarter of 2009. New sales and technical staff were hired in B.C., Alberta, Ontario, Quebec, and Nova Scotia. Key infrastructure and staffing investments have been made specifically in the Montreal, QC region to address the growing business opportunity for HDX in French speaking Canada.
Mr. Howell noted that during the 1st quarter of 2009, HDX installed the HDX Fingerprints(TM) point of sale solution at over fifty restaurants in five separate quick service restaurant chains. HDX installed 290 sites of integrated debit and credit and released version II of HDX's hosted enterprise management suite, HDX Webview(TM). The business intelligence tool has been installed at a tier one quick service restaurant chain and will continue to be enhanced and marketed to new and existing clients.
Mr. Howell stated further that the majority of legacy accounting costs have now been depleted which clears the way for greater profitability. The former Dexit office at 1 Richmond Street was sublet and vacated effective January 7th 2009. In the first quarter of 2009 HDX recognized a liability of $257,475 for the remaining net lease obligation, which will result in an annual reduction in operating expenses of more than $240,000 beginning in Q3 2009. In the first quarter of 2009, lease costs were $84,000 for the vacated 1 Richmond Street offices. As of the third quarter 2009, HDX will be free of this overhead except for a lease sublease subsidy of $8,143 per month or $97,716 per year for the Richmond Street office lease which expires May 2011.
About HDX
Hosted Data Transaction Solutions Inc. is in the business of managing merchant transactions with consumers and facilitating payment. HDX develops and deploys touch screen POS system software and associated enterprise management tools and has developed and deployed numerous POS applications. HDX also provides system hardware integration services, merchant staff training, system installation services, and post sale software and hardware support services.
HDX leading edge technology also includes customer self serve kiosks and "line buster" mobile point of sale terminals. These products have been designed to dramatically enhance customer throughput and drastically reduce customer queues. These technologies are especially effective in high foot traffic environments that have limited cash register counter space, limited retail square footage, and the absence of a drive through.
HDX offers a complete suite of products and solutions for merchants. HDX develops, sells, deploys, and supports:
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Touch Screen POS Systems for Quick Service
Integrated RFID Gift Card Payment System
Self Serve Customer Kiosks
Mobile Wireless POS Terminals
Fine Dining/Table Service POS Systems
Integrated Digital Video Surveillance and Recording Systems
Electronic cash registers
Web enabled business intelligence applications
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Forward-Looking Statements
This discussion includes certain forward-looking statements that are based upon current expectations, which involve risks and uncertainties associated with our business and the environment in which the business operates. Any statements contained herein that are not statements of historical facts may be deemed to be forward-looking, including those identified by the expressions "anticipate", "believe", "plan", "estimate", "expect", "intend", and similar expressions to the extent they relate to HDX or its management. The forward-looking statements are not historical facts, but reflect HDX's current expectations regarding future results or events. These forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from current expectations, including the matters discussed under "Risks and Uncertainties" in the Annual Information Form filed on March 30, 2009 with the regulatory authorities. HDX assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking statements, or to update the reasons why actual results could differ from those reflected in the forward-lookig statements.
SOURCE: Hosted Data Transaction Solutions Inc.
Paul Howell, President/CEO, Hosted Data Transaction Solutions Inc. (HDX), (416) 703-6462, extension 2263

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