RECOMMENDATION BY THE AUDIT COMMITTEE OF NEXT BIOMETRICS GROUP ASA

1 BACKGROUND

The company's auditor, PriceWaterhouseCoopers AS ("PwC"), has conducted the audit of the company since 2019, have thus maintained the mandate over a five year period. In connection with the audit committee's yearly review of the company's internal control procedures with the auditor, the audit committee decided to conduct a tender process in accordance with the instructions for the committee in order to determine whether to propose the appointment of a new auditor, cf. the Norwegian Public Limited Liability Companies Act Section 6-43 and Regulation (EU) No 537/2014 Article 16 nr. 2 and 6.

2 PROCESS

The company's current auditor, PwC, and RSM Norge AS ("RSM") were invited to participate in the tender process and were invited to submit offers. The audit committee has met with the selected audit firms, and reviewed their audit approaches and proposals for the upcoming 2024 audit. The offers were assessed and ranked on the basis of the following criteria:

  • Audit fee;
  • Competence, capacity, quality, industry knowledge, engagement, local presence;
  • Business understanding; and
  • Planning and delivery of the audit including scope.

3 EVALUATION

The audit committee is overall very satisfied with the quality and expertise reflected of both of the received offers. Both these offers are considered to be competitive with respect to price and the other more qualitative criteria Finally, the audit committee decided that RSM had a better offer as a whole. The audit committee attached importance to quality, expertise, knowledge of the businesses in which the company operates, and audit fee in total when making the decision.

4 RECOMMENDATION

The committee therefore recommends RSM Norge AS as NEXT's auditor for the 2024 financial year. The audit committee has not been influenced by any third parties and is not - and has not been - subject to any agreement with a third party, which in any way may restrict the selection of specific auditors or auditing firms, Cf. the Norwegian Public Limited Liability Companies Act Section 6-43 and Regulation (EU) No 537/2014 Article 16 nr. 2 and 6.

Oslo, 23 April 2024

On behalf of the Audit Committee, Petter Fjellstad (chair)

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NEXT Biometrics Group ASA published this content on 25 April 2024 and is solely responsible for the information contained therein. Distributed by Public, unedited and unaltered, on 25 April 2024 08:45:02 UTC.