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Neil, I sincerely enjoy your excellent intelligent posts and admire the time dedicated, but I wonder if you’ve lost objectivity?
Cognitive dissonance is a powerful force.. leads to self-justification in the best of us. That shifting sand analogy I used can carry investors to a place they don’t recognise without awareness of change.
So, serious questions, if I may:
Could you please explain your thinking behind “believing’ in the final outcome when:
1) Allan Syms with “market in near future” quote was either naive, optimistic or willingly deceptive. (Any one of those is bad trait for a leader of empirical science).
2) Last year he said we were about to start clinical trials, but this was patently false. (Again, deceptive, naive or optimistic)
3) The Portugese reagent company - supposedly the best - is out of the picture (with no RNS) and a French company ‘suddenly’ involved. (With no RNS).
The obvious conclusion is there’s probably been problems (of nature unknown). That’s a fair assumption, no? (Again, no communication from CEO, so assume negatives)
4) With Reagents not even verified at scale-up - and clinical trials posing another unknown, the permutations are unknown. Where is the foundation for staunchly standing by your ‘belief’?
5) Is Biotechne still involved..to what degree? Ciz is so shoddy with communication, anything could be going on.
Most people - me included - wanted a bigger tie-in with Biotechne. It hasn’t happened.
6) China no longer in the picture it seems. I think my first post I warned of this to much derision. Why? - again NO update from BOD. Nada! Investors seem happy to go along like it’s all fine!
Blinkers off, people !! It’s huge and, indeed, the main Market reason some people invested! The Avuncular cuddly AS probably eaten alive over there.
7) Not using drawdown. Not selling CDT shares. Probably mates rates for a raise. Awful - again. Trust?
8) Don’t you agree that the direction has appeared to have changed? The tone? Material things? Timescales?
Without knowing the full context / picture, how can you remain confident with duff data and disingenuous company statements. I don’t understand the basis of your belief, apart from “It will all be ok in the end”…which isn’t an argument based on the facts.
One of the main rules of investing - divesting - to me is simple:
When companies start lying/ being liberal with truth on promises/ timescales and progress, it's usually time to , at the very least, question your investment, or get out.
The awfully nice Allan Syms does not impress me, and after that shocking RNS plus the antecedence regarding communication with Ciz, I no longer understand my investment.
Do you? Really?
Ps Brondby/ Green especially. Also love your thoughtful posts.
For transparency, I sold 2/3 of my holdings after that diabolical RNS at 10% loss yesterday. That RNS was the pits. Very disappointed.
I’ll keep 1/3 and assess
Some open questions. What if:-
1. any delay is due to widening the scope of the test to make it more valuable?
2. one set of clinical trials has been done, but we didn't like the results, so are optimising to make it more valuable?
3. points 2 and 3 are linked i.e. CIZ tried to use the same test on different cancers but identified a different reagent would be preferable?
4. progress is being made ('scaling up' 'commercial' 'insurance codes') but folk are just impatient and don't realise how long the process takes?
Unless you have sector experience (I don't) and /or an inside line to the BOD (I don't), it's all guesswork. One thing is certain, AS is playing his cards close to his chest. I like the understated approach. He has a good track record, so I trust him to deliver to the best of his ability. However, I understand that other folks may have lost trust, and that is a personal thing for them, and it is hard to regain once lost.
It's a tipping point for many of us ...from giving the board the benefit of the doubt to no longer being willing to do so.
They should expect a much tougher line from investors moving forward and be prepared to provide the information we need.
We have a lot of reasonable questions and they need answering.
Evening TT…I’m sure Neil will reply later, but he tends to do the night shift, so thought I’d chip in with my thoughts :-)
1) Allan Syms with “market in near future” quote was either naive, optimistic or willingly deceptive. (Any one of those is bad trait for a leader of empirical science).
(DG) I think this was an off guard comment given it was an internal call with scientists, I think very near term can be 12 months with that audience. However, if there had been better dialogue with shareholders we would be clear on timings rather than relying on inference.
2) Last year he said we were about to start clinical trials, but this was patently false. (Again, deceptive, naive or optimistic)
(DG) I think probably naive, links into your point 1) if steps are known and timescales, these issues don’t arise.
3) The Portugese reagent company - supposedly the best - is out of the picture (with no RNS) and a French company ‘suddenly’ involved. (With no RNS).
The obvious conclusion is there’s probably been problems (of nature unknown). That’s a fair assumption, no? (Again, no communication from CEO, so assume negatives)
(DG) I think there is way too much being read into this. There will have been a period of refinement of the various consumables and processes. We know it works on the protein simple platform, they know it will drive accurate results otherwise we wouldn’t have got to this stage. You aren’t getting folks to stump up £600k or getting Bio-Techne signing RNS statements without knowing there is a tick there.
That testing will also had to look at sensitivities around shelf life, cold storage etc… and among that different mAbs. Again, I think this comes down to comms, rather than anything sinister. You can’t just pull these off the shelf. If they wanted to change something that they think improves sensitivity, resilience etc… there’s a process of gene synthesis, sequencing, engineering mAbs etc… time for this could be anything from 4 weeks to 4 months. It sounds like they have now got to a final commercial solution here. Add to that the question around capability, commercial scale etc… I’d expect deck chairs to move in that process. Having said this, if they had advised the longer part of the process is finalising mAbs, establishing them for scale, rather than folding that into a generic clinical testing narrative, folks would understand it more. Equally if in the RNS they’d stated they chose Proteogenix over Bio-Techne or Fair Journey because of X and Y, that would have been acceptable - back to comms again…
Part 2…
5) Is Biotechne still involved..to what degree? Ciz is so shoddy with communication, anything could be going on.
Most people - me included - wanted a bigger tie-in with Biotechne. It hasn’t happened.
(DG) Agree, wanted them involved for scale so we were closer to an IP royalty model rather than the OBD scenario - is currently unclear re Bio-Techne.
6) China no longer in the picture it seems. I think my first post I warned of this to much derision. Why? - again NO update from BOD. Nada! Investors seem happy to go along like it’s all fine!
(DG) Personal view - couldn’t care about China at the moment. More than enough to keep them busy in US - scale of opportunity is sufficient there alone. Mail that, then worry about other markets. Would be more concerned if China did pop up given they aren’t juggling existing commitments brilliantly.
7) Not using drawdown. Not selling CDT shares. Probably mates rates for a raise. Awful - again. Trust?
(DG) I don’t think CDT shares were ever going to be sold in ideal world - he had mentioned a long while back about building an asset base of these devs. On the shares, I think the discussions on funding would have been going on for weeks, and the climb in SP in the last 2 weeks was problematic, if it had hovered around 2.2p wouldn’t have been an issue. Climbed on expectation of news - comms again!
Green, thanks v much. On first reading fair points, but will read again, digest and reflect
Hi again Green..I've had a re-read and think.
Imo, with voluntarily or involuntarily confirmation bias, you’re giving Ciz lots of leg room, maybe shifting your own views a tad to fit the prevailing info (ala shifting sands I mentioned - you may not realise you’re doing it)
We were all extremely happy with “in the market in the near future” and gave it weight; now you’re retrospectively putting “context” on it and giving AS lots of leeway ( although bio-tech timelines are different to real world). However, you can’t have it both ways to fit shifting disclosures by Ciz.
Reagents - your take on it is “refinements”, but that is not evidentiary based, just giving them the benefit. Refinements to me means - in context of “clinical trials being done”, it DIDN’T work. I’m surmising here, but I think the sensitivity data on scale-up was poor. You can’t assume by changing the source that this will improve. It could be an intrinsic problem. (It may not be - but you’re assuming to the positive - of it purely being “Comms”. “Reading too much into it” is a subjective feeling.
China - something that was once pivotal, almost a Raison D’etre for some , is now “couldn’t care about China”.
Now, I completely understand that you don’t care about China, but a cohort on here (Jace et al) used this to prove-up their £££s valuation with £100Millions/ year.
The (possible) loss of China reveals something not simply of monetary value itself but the institutional naivety of Ciz. They spent so much time developing that ‘relationship”, flawed from the start IMO (got to understand Chinese mentality). Now it’ not a deal, but that’ ok??
This, in itself reveals the weakness and possible gullible nature of the BOD.
All these things cannot and shouldn’t be taken in isolation; they build a picture.
It’s the investor who has to try to see that picture clearly, without bias. Hard when money is invested in something you want to succeed.
But ,again, the most important element is that if you cannot trust what they're saying, how do you ever trust what they're saying??
Hi TechTonic,
Started writing a long reply to your post, but too long for my phone!
A few key points. I re-read Aug RNS . Ciz has never stated they have started clinical trials. The Aug RNS states that recent development "meet key milestones to begin commercial clinical trials" , not that trials had started. Specifically, the key milestone was that they could get it to run on an automated platform. It goes on to say ciz is "now engaged in clinical trials *design*" which actually indicates they haven’t started. This subtlty was discussed on the board at the time , though I'd forgotten about it.
Trials have to use same prodction reagents they will use for real, so same manufacturing, handling, transportation protocols. Allan does talk about the work needed for this in the Aug Stockbox interview.
Sounds to me like we've assumed trials had commenced without appreciating the work needed for the reagent production. I am guilty of this, as i expected trials had begun.
I don’t think we have run any formal trials at all yet. No evidence at all that we have run trials and they failed. That is complete supposition on your part, perhaps negative confirmation bias you night say?
Indeed, spending all that money on scaling up suggests to me they have used these reagents that have been developed on some internal trials and they work. Otherwise why proceed to scale up and incur that cost? Supposition on my part, but seems like common sense.
Existing investors have just stumped up £600k. Would they do that for a random punt on whether these new reagents would work?
I have questions over why we raised this way, but it actually speak of confidence that existing investors have chosen to stump up more cash. Also interested to know who the new investor is, though it may not be significant. If its BioTechne on the other hand...
Re Biotechne. Still time for them to be involed. Again, no reason to assume we've changed at platform at all.
Why would we? Its one of the best and worked sufficiently well in trials for them to RNS it. We will need partners for a point of care test. That is the really big market and Biotechne would be good here.
Proteogenix. Could simply be the best company to scale up. Again, no suggestion here that they have gone elsewhere because something else has failed.
My problem here is that ciz is not communicating very well at all. Especially the stages and timelines that need to be gone through. My jolt in confidence from the last RNS was around the trials not having started, but having re-read RNS , unless anyone can find anything to the contrary, i dont think ciz has ever said they have. But they have been unclear about the steps, sequencing of those steps and timelines!
It really wouldn't take much to get this share moving again. If we really are just requiring scale up, re-run of trials, accreditation and a charge code, then we are not too far away. Question is, is there some other steps ciz has omm
Oh , on China.
Ive said before, lets focus on getting this LDT working in the US first. If it works, China will want it. Whether they will get it likely depends on politics, IP protection, partnerships and a multitude of other things. There is a large enough market elsewhere. I cant see anyone having invested purely on China, though it does lead to some of the larger estimates on share price.
First post was cut off...
Question is, are there some other steps ciz has ommited to tell us about? That is why they need to communicate better.
All very reasonable points, Brond, and maybe it is negative confirmation bias on my part.
Just specifically in response to your £600K funding raise, YES , they would do it for a random punt, because I know that select shareholders are courted and given first dibs on these - because, as OAPk alluded to, they know there'll be a (false ) rise to let them out with a profit - if they haven't already forward sold.
I'll be surprised if there's any sticky hands in this raise, although, if so, that would add a lot of weight to it... Maybe they have done it for that maybe they have done it for their benefit..and if it was Biotechne, this would rocket.
Hi Greend100 & Techtonic
If i may, i will respond tomorrow.
I have a mass of notes, interview comparisons, written documents, questions and answers that i am currently re-visiting, and i intend submitting a further request that the Bod address specific questions.
I would rather give a more informed answer, than a quick response.
Neil
Neil 👍
With the limited stock issued (a good thing as keep dilution down) its unlikely the "new investor" will be over 3% for a TR1. But you never know.
I am sceptical regarding the forward selling. Hear that a lot, but if you have evidence of this, go to the FCA as that is of course insider trading, illegal and punishable by up to 10 years in jail. Shouldn't be hard to trace the money. Hemce why i am sceptical.
The share price rose becuase of anticipation of news, and Benkhe having been found to have set up ciz Bio Inc. and his remarks on LinkedIn.
And these do still suggest ciz intents to conduct buismess in the US soon.
But time will tell of course.
Brond..?! Forward selling? False rises, Brokers?
I'm not going to be the one who tells you about Santa!😁
Must’ve been a lucky find. But then the LinkedIn posts appeared after the information of the US company was fed in to Telegram.
How many “PI’s” searched for new companies in Texas as part of their reading about CIZ. Such an obvious search is it?
I didn’t until it was posted here for the outsiders.
Who was fed that and by whom? That just coincided with a nice rise in SP before the Placing announcement nicely.
Whoever “found” that info didn’t find it the day company was registered or if they did sat on it.
So remember when you’re looking at any new share to trade or invest in to search the database in Texas for any new company registrations DYOR. Unless you’re an insider lucky enough be invited to partake in placings. (Not many PIs have that type of funding available)
OAPK20, that's some claim. I found the Cizzle Bio Inc start up and posted it within minutes here. It WAS a lucky find, only from seeing 'CEO@ Cizzle bio inc USA'. on Bill Behnkes Linkedin page and well, adding 2+2 from there. None of us of course should have to be working this stuff out regardless and does damage my view of the BODs transparency with retail shareholders.
Evening all.
Techtonic - that Santa one did make me laugh!
Brondby, unfortunately forward selling is most definitely a problem and there are many,many examples to be seen.
However, in this last placing, i am not entirely convinced. There is something not consistent with the normal trading pattern when this takes place, as to what has happened here over the last week or so. Can't put my finger on what/why is happening, but there is definitely something different.
The trouble with having so many bits of information/interviews/reports to cross reference, is that this reply was going to end up 4 and a half x A4 pages long! and i can make arguments both for and against the same piece of information, So i
won't go over the same things again and try and keep it brief so as not to put you all in a coma, and hopefully it is not all over the place!
Greend100 covered most of the points to a good degree, and i fully agree with sentiment here about the loss of confidence in the bod's comms.
There are a number of inconsistencies in what Allan has said. Now whether that is accidental, purposeful, or just down to timescales i don't know, and we will each form our own opinion. But the fact is whichever option, it has had a bad effect on shareholders.
I'll list a few as examples.
1. March 26th interview. ".....Busily optimising our assay........" but you told us 24th April 2023 that key milestones on optimising had been met. Did something change?
"Generating new antibodies....." again, we have been told on more than one occasion that new antibodies had been generated.
Depending on your point of view, why? or is it as previously mentioned, that the increasing library of antibodies will be used in breast cancer detection (which we know is already in progress) and the other types i mentioned in previous posts?
Is this why the process appears to be taking longer than we all thought/expected?
Will the test which was initially being launched as lung cancer detection, being modified to use the same platform to detect other cancers?
2. Sept 23 interview - ".....goal is to COMPLETE our clinical trials......" any reasonable person would interpret that as the trials are in PROGRESS, since any other statement would surely be "goal is to COMMENCE"
3. As other have pointed out, on interviews, he spends most of the time explaining what Cizzle Biotecnology is about, and only brief content is on the actual announcement.
What i have noticed also, is that he starts on a subject then goes off on a tangent. For example, on last weeks interview he said
"key thing and what our shareholders are wanting to know is, what the progress has been on the development of our early stage lung cancer test "
He didn't even answer his own question!" he went on to say "these funds are going to be dedicated towards the priority of getting our first commercial test to market"
Same interview, his own question......"people would like to know when will this become available
Boll==ks its just deleted part 2!
See if i can remember part 2
....in the UK"
Again, he didn't answer his own question, but went on about USA
Sept 2023 interview - "obviously our shareholders are very keen to understand what's going on" Well how about telling us?
Like what is the significance of ProteoGenix? we know about extending the library of antibodies, as this has been discussed previously. But is it an extension to the original lung cancer test to include breast cancer (which we know is in progress) and the other cancer types i posted about? or is it a way to aid entry into EU with CE mark? We are all left guessing.
One issue i have either way, is i was under the impression that LDT had to be manufactured/validated/ used in the same laboratory? How does ProteoGenix tie in with us?
There has been a bit of discussion as to whether the China deal is dead.
No, not as far as i understand.
China cannot progress with kit development until we supply them with the validated mabs/reagents. There is also a binding agreement in place.
Techtonic, you asked why i am still sure of a positive outcome. I refer you to my previous answer, but will add that despite all the negatives i can find, and i admit i can find plenty if i look at it in detail, the fundamentals of the company have not changed from those prior to a p++s poor RNS. last week.
New investors.
£620k seems a very specific amount. Possibly the bod now know the costs of getting this over the line now that we are down to the last stages?
Neil
Thanks v much for that Neil and I think it reinforces, supports my/our concerns here. Again, I really do appreciate your views, and it's a flaw of my character that I sometimes shoot from the hip. Big heart, open mind and reason lies within though.
I think we can all agree on this now - that we don't know fully what is going on, and we NEED better communication with specifics to make a judgment on our own investments.
It's just not good enough and the company, as you say , have been sending out mixed messages (at the very least). Speaking with forked -tongue.
My unease comes from not even knowing what they're saying! Allan uses "done, partly done, being done and to be done" in highly unspecific vague waffly lingo. It's so loose, it's unprofessional. I've certainly lost trust in what he says.
We don't know what we have achieved , we don't know what the problems have been (some for sure, I'm guessing) and we don't know what is to be done - and we don't know the timescales.
Neil, I wouldn't read too much into the £620k specifics. And also more vague semantics from Alan " to go towards the completion of commercialization"..
"Towards" in Ciz language could mean anything.
The trading patterns in the 3 weeks prior to RNS were irregular. I've been mentioning block sells for ages. It wasn't normal PI stuff. That's all that I can say with surety.
Neil, I would be grateful if you could keep us posted if you hear any more.
Ps Brond..sorry about Santa, because you seem such a lovely lad 😁
No offense taken techT. My point is really that forward selling gets banded about off pat in every raise without any real evidence.
On LDTs
"Qualified labs may create a new LDT in four basic ways (see Figure 3): • Starting from scratch, assembling relevant testing reagents and other FDA-reviewed testing components. • Combining elements of FDA-reviewed test kits with components made or separately acquired by the lab. • Obtaining the protocol for a test developed as an LDT by another facility. • Altering an FDA-cleared or -approved IVD by, for instance, enabling the product to analyze patient specimens that have been stored longer than the test’s labeling allows."
https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/reports/2021/10/the-role-of-lab-developed-tests-in-the-in-vitro-diagnostics-market
Not sure that helps us know which route we are going down, but seems that its routine for not everything to originate in the lab.
Well , absolutely no offence intended Brond. Good-humoured banter.
Again. ..
Your post gets to the crux of things without actually stating the subject.
Whatever is going on, whichever path they are taking, progress.
WE NEED TO KNOW. As shareholders we have a RIGHT to know
(Not every little scientific step or daily increments in the lab, but an overall picture ..why details on reagents etc have fundamentally changed)
A lot of the posts on this forum confuse me a little bit.
The lack of news from the bod likely means they do not know if this solution is completely valid on a commercial level. Without sufficient data supporting this major investors will not come along. This type of cancer detection is the future of early cancer detection, and the biomarker Cizzle are working on will make up a suite of biomarkers used in the future to detect most cancers in one simple blood test.
The issue is, this is going to be a huge business and there will be many research labs working on a similar solution. Without demonstrating our biomarker is a commercial solution we won’t get any larger companies interested in this.
I think the news that a private investor is investing in the company is great news as it is likely we will need more funding like this in the future to get past the initial trials.
Step 1 which I’m not sure has been proven yet, is can Cizzle create a test that is accurate and consistent - no results from even the first step yet.
Step 2 - larger trials, gathering more data - enough data to prove to larger pharma companies this is a legitimate solution.
Step 3 - commercialisation.
We still have a long way to go, and until there is results from step 1 the bod have very little to talk about, apart from repeating what’s been previously said, with an aim to drum up interest from private investors.