The Cyprus-based Neo&Bee Company has terminated operation some timebefore its CEO Danny Brewster went missing. Some customers accuse him forfraudulence, but Mr. Brewster names personal reasons behind his hasty disappearance.
Neo &Bee has won the market with a nasty advertising campaign, offering businesswallets and Bee cards with corresponding terminals and APIs earlier this year. Ambitiousbusiness has been stopped by the end of March, while the flow of transactions wasnot even self-sufficient.
However,the service has re-launched on April 4th at 5:00 PM EST somequestions remain unanswered.
Personal Reasons
DannyBrewster does not consider his move as fleeing from the country. He believes itwas a reasonable reaction on threats he has received. The temporary absencewill end once the matter will be cleared by the local police.Twitter sources suggest, however, that "Danny doesn't speak Greek and he most likely called either UK embassy or UK police, not the Cyprus police".
Mr.Brewster explains:
“I left Cyprus on a short-termtemporary basis. I haven't shipped anything from Cyprus and I certainly haven'trun away with company or people's money or Bitcoins.”
He is alsoafraid that the blackmailer is not joking, threatening the family of thebusinessman:
“I received direct threats targeteddirectly at my daughter. They have been reported to the relevant authorities.”
Leavingthe country for a while is one of the methods to avoid potential danger:
“Once those threats were made I tookthe advice to remain outside of Cyprus and remove contact with anyone thatcould be responsible for the threats. This included not speaking with membersof staff that could be responsible.”
Temporary Conditions
The Neo &Bee Company cannot be calledhuge as the staff consists of 11 people. 15 new specialists have been recentlyemployed to widen the branches and establish a call-center.
Some ofthem claim that they have not been paid for March and even invested personalassets in the development of the company. Most of them have resigned and thecentral office has been abandoned.
Inaddition local police received to statements from customers, who provided thecompany with 20 000 and 15 000 euros respectively, but have not received theirBitcoins.
On the contrary,the police office has not registered any complaints from Danny Brewster tostart any investigation of the threats.
Interference ofHavelock Investments
HavelockInvestments also lacks any particular information, but made the decision tostop trading. According to them the re-launch of the service was possible dueto instructions from Neo & Bee.
While thefinancial status of the company remains unknown, Mr. Brewster insisted:
“Every single Bitcoin raised and spentis accounted for, any claims of embezzlement are nothing but empty claims withno foundation.”
He hasalso mentioned the notorious Japan-based exchanger Mt.Gox:
“UKYO [the operator of BitFunder] alsoowes me an additional 260BTC separately from the 1,420BTC. I also have 369.8BTCof my own Bitcoin stuck with Mt.Gox that would have been given to the companyto settle all creditors and continue operations whilst more capital was raised.Having funds on Mt. Gox was a personal risk that I assumed and no company fundswere ever held on there.”
However,the investigation has to be continued to prove a deeper connection between thepresent condition of Neo &Bee and Mt.Gox service. Cointelegraph isgoing to follow the situation and report on time.