Small caps round-up: Datong, All Leisure, CSS Stellar

Covert intelligence company Datong broke cover on Wednesday to announce that a patent infringement claim brought against it had been thrown out by the Court of Appeal.

MMI Research had maintained that a third party product sold by Datong infringed the UK element of a patent jointly owned by MMI. Datong had made a provision of £0.3m to cover costs of litigation, including any potential compensation it might be required to pay, but now expects the costs associated with the court case will be substantially lower than £0.3m.

The cruise industry has had a tough time of it of late, but All Leisure Group brought a bit of cheer to the sector with its full year results, which showed the company moving firmly into the black. Profit before tax of £5.7m for the year ended October 31st was a substantial improvement on the loss of £2.1m recorded the year before. The full-year dividend has been maintained at 1.31p.

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CSS Stellar, the investment company that recently decided that it wanted to get into the natural resources sector, said that Gold Mines of Wales (GMOW), in which it has a 49% stake, has had its licence to search for gold in the county of Gwynedd in Wales renewed for a year, commencing February 10th, 2012. CSS Stellar plans to work with GMOW and the local authorities to assess the economic viability of re-opening meaningful gold mining operations.