As the old saying goes, where there’s muck, there’s brass. It is an adage that followers of Augean may be toasting this morning.

The company, which operates land-fill and treatment plants at 11 sites in the UK, revealed yesterday that it had received a number of approaches, which may or may not lead to an offer for the group at a “significant premium” to its present share price. Augean emphasised that all such discussions were at an early stage.

After the market closed, One Fifty One, an Irish group, confirmed that it had made an approach for Augean and that it already holds 26.89 per cent of its shares. Augean said that it was confident that current-year market expectations would be met. The shares rose more than 38 per cent, or 26p, to 94¼p.

Axon, the IT services company, rose 103½p to 606p as the market reacted to weekend news that it had agreed a 600p cash offer from Infosys, of India, and amid expectations of a higher counterbid. Jonathan Imlah, an Altium Securities analyst, speculated that Infosys had not made a knockout bid and there was room for a counter closer to 700p a share. Stephen Cardell, chief executive of Axon, said that his board had a duty to consider any higher offer, should one be forthcoming. Axon also reported a 28 per cent rise in first-half sales.

Dmatek, which makes electronic tags for prisoners, rose 8p to 134½p after announcing a sharp increase in interim pretax profit to $3.4 million (£1.85 million), helped by strong growth in the law enforcement technologies market.

Goindustry-DoveBid fell 1½p to 6.625p after the industrial auction group gave warning that annual profits would fall short of market expectations.

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