14Available-for-sale financial assets

Investments in listed companies

The fair value of listed investments is determined with reference to prices quoted on the relevant exchange at the balance sheet date. The Group had no listed investments at 31 December 2008, following the disposal of its investment in Superscape Group plc during the year. The cost and market value of Superscape at 31 December 2007 were £2,652,000 and £1,180,000 respectively.

Other long-term investments

Those unlisted companies in which the Group has invested are early-stage development enterprises, which are generating value for shareholders through research and development activities, and most do not currently report profits. The directors do not consider it possible to estimate with precision the fair value of the Group’s investments in these companies (carrying value at 31 December 2008: £1,167,000; 2007: £3,701,000) as they are, by definition, not traded on an organised market and are unique in their activities. However, based on recent fundraising transactions by these companies and, where possible, following review of relevant financial information prepared by the companies, the directors are of the opinion that the fair value of these investments approximates to carrying value. Provisions have been made against other investments to reflect any impairment in value.

Included in other investments are the Group’s less than 1% investment in the share capital of Palmchip Corporation (a private fabless chip company based in California); a less than 1% investment in the share capital of Pixim Inc. (also a private fabless chip company based in California); a 1.4% holding in Reciva Limited (an internet radio company based in the UK); and a minority holding in Embest Info & Tech Co. Ltd (a niche developer of embedded hardware and software based in China). The Group also has an investment in the preference share capital of CoWare Inc. (a company which develops system-on-chip software for a wide range of applications); and an investment in the preference shares of Luminary Micro Inc. (a private fabless semiconductor company based in Texas which develops pioneering ARM architecture-based SoC products). Neither investment in CoWare or Luminary confers any voting rights.

In 2007, the Group invested $5,000,000 (£2,534,000) in W&W Communications Inc. (an unlisted US company) by way of an interest-bearing convertible loan note; and a further $2,000,000 (£1,029,000) during 2008. W&W was acquired in December 2008, at which time the loan notes were repaid including the accrued interest. The exchange gain noted in the above table results from this US dollar denominated loan note.

Available-for-sale financial assets include the following:

Available-for-sale financial assets are denominated in the following currencies: