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I am delighted with their approach of setting realistic guidance and delivering it (rather than making wild claims to gather attention, and then failing to deliver, which any student of the history of the battery industry will know it is littered with). The future looks extremely bright for long term Ilika shareholders imo.
Ilika also hired another Sales VP (who also had an impressive background and who presented very well, but whose name I can’t recall – this is my lack not his; he was equally impressive as John Tinson). Through these extremely high quality hires, it is apparent that Graeme Purdy and his top management team are focussed on turning their scientific and engineering excellence into profits for the shareholders, whilst retaining a leading position in what will be a very rapidly growing market place for nano-scale batteries.
As previously advised by the company (and in line with stock exchange rules) no market sensitive information was given. No doubt some PIs foolishly bought in anticipation of the investor day and are now dumping those (tiny) holdings. Frankly, I am sure that long term shareholders would rather not have such myopic people on the share register (which is now over 15% US based according to Steve Boydell CFO).
Having said that, personally I think they will be announcing a full year ahead orderbook not long after product validation (which will happen after process validation, as confirmed by Paul Marron, who was clearly totally on top of the production process at FAB1).
They are also currently evaluating the relative merits of increasing capacity at FAB1, bringing in-house the rest of the many processes (thinning and dicing for instance) of Stereax production and FAB2 (for which there is space next door…). Recall that the cost of FAB2 was already raised in the May 2020 fund raise (which I am glad to have taken part in).
If there is an area of weakness, it was in my opinion their ham-fisted fund-raise of ~£25 mio for Goliath at a 30% discount to the prevailing market. If they needed the money (which they did; in comparison QuantumScape are making losses greater than the entire market capitalisation of Ilika in less than 3 months, every 3 months ...), they should have raised when the share price was rising above £2.75 less than 6 months earlier. This would have resulted in greater funds at lesser dilution. However, that is now in the past and the money at least has been raised and is being put to extremely efficient use.
In summary, we already knew that Brian Hayden and his team were world leaders in terms of the tech (both the chemistry and in overcoming engineering problems to turn the science into commercially viable product). The shift of focus to commerciality was definitely needed, but the quality of their hiring shows just how able to evolve this Management team are. They will need to follow this up with results next financial year in terms of Sales and scale-up plans in order to continue to show their effectiveness.
The company has changed a lot since my last site visit (pre-Covid) and is clearly gearing up for commercialisation of their world beating intellectual property. Overall, I was very impressed with progress.
Ilika was founded on the back of ground breaking scientific research headed by Prof. Brian Hayden. He and his team have taken the science forward through advanced engineering (Tool 1 and Tool 2 were made bespoke to Ilika’s designs for example) towards commercial reality. My top take-away was that the Ilika’s management are now also adding focus and resources towards commerciality.
Most of the traffic on bulletin boards about Ilika seems to be focussed on Goliath (batteries for EV’s). Whilst there was a very full update on Goliath progress (and a tour of the new Goliath Research and Development laboratories), which is going very well (the analysts at Liberum and Berenberg both agreed that none of the big name Goliath competitors were ahead of Ilika in terms of that technology, although they are vastly higher market valuations), I will concentrate this write up on Stereax as it will be the driver of nearer term sales revenue and seems to be less well understood. Bear in mind Ilika are in many ways creating the market through the imminent availability of Stereax batteries in quantities which will allow incorporation in commercial products.
The new(ish) VP of Sales and Marketing, John Tinson was clearly out of the highest of top drawers. It was clear that Ilika are determined to nurture their client base (recall ~27 med tech device makers and 11 Internet of Things sensor makers have already been buying Ilika’s Stereax batteries for evaluation, re-certification and research and development purposes). Through his presentation and in Q&A, it was quite obvious that he understood in great detail Stereax’s market segmentation and the price inelastic nature of demand from Med Tech in particular. Tinson made clear that given the limited ability for Ilika to supply in the short term (FAB1 will be able to produce ~£13 mio worth of batteries per annum) that Ilika will be exploiting their understanding of the market for Ilika’s commercial gain.
(tbc as there is a character limit).
directors talk
https://www.***************************/ilika-stereax-solid-state-battery-manufacturing-facility-a-key-point-in-its-evolution-analyst-interview/4121038306
Hopefully, the money men will like what they see tomorrow and the sp will reflect that going forward.
On another note, where is Buzzer? ;-)
Friday is a great day as retail and institutional investors are allowed to visit the new factory at Chandlers Ford. Should be a great day for the sp . With todays movement we should be easy over £2 by Friday.
I had planned to visit but cannot make it.
Looking like in the next 10 minutes !!
Not going to take long then!
So it seems !
The SP was going sideways until he turned up.
Seems like the blue touch paper has been lit next year is going to be so good:-)
Amused by the thread's subject text, the share price is now touching 180p, so that didn't take long! Capital Markets Day for Ilika on Friday, so maybe barnetpeter's "Back to 200 plus?" will also come true in time for Xmas...
More seriously, I like Ilika for getting on with its programme and now manufacturing batteries at a reasonable scale whilst progressing its greater ambitions, all the while taking care not to burn through cash too fast by making good use of JVs and grant funding; indeed with Stereax manufacturing this will also generate some revenue to offset Goliath costs.
I used to think you were an idiot buzz. However now you have been found to be the greatest reverse indicator of our era. Just keep bringing it on. Many thanks as you are putting my kids through college.
Easily see 200p by Christmas and, knowing the market and how volatile it is, could see it before. Expecting news, however distant in prediction, on Goliath too and the markets could spike the price.
Gets difficult then as to what price will hold but it's a lovely problem to have.
Stereax facility open and no news on orders or licences. You want to kmow why?
Once again buzz you are completely right.
It’s not like less that five months ago the market agreed to give them £24.7m at more than 86% of the current valuation now is it?
If Ilika were on Dragons Den I imagine they would get scolded because of the price valuation.
Cheers Buzz, Here’s to another great week !
Every clock is correct twice a day. Ilika has no profits and the share price will correct to value.
still a few years away though as they've previously stated
Dissipline, you are spot on, in each respect. The only thing is, whilst I note that the (inverse) Force is particularly powerful with him/her/it (note for instance his previous calls on Rockhopper) and therefore RogK/BustThomas/ whatever her/his/its next name is is truly worth noting, beware that once such a reverse indicator is aware of broad interest, they sometimes change their methods and lose even their (reverse) predictive power becoming just noise rather than signal. I am grateful for all RocK's help so far.