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Hi, Game changing news. I hope so but it could the wrong sort of news e.g. suspension due to lack of funds....Syme are not growing revenues at pace that would convince many investors that they have a viable future. Too few deals, little or no revenue from deals struck. After several years with no demonstrable growth, I can't see many serious investors racing to their rescue. However, AZ may just pull a rabbit out of the hat and keep his company running thus giving himself a nice monthly salary.
Hi, what is the reason you think it will do well? Finances are weak, sales growth for a start-up is not that impressive. It may go up due to speculative traders but it seems to lack a good RNS with concrete news. Good luck with you buy - strikes me your hoping for people to raise the price so you can exit at a profit.
Hi, is this something that the FCA has in its scope? From here: https://www.fca.org.uk/about/what-we-do/our-perimeter it would seem to be outside of their remit. So, making a noise won't make any difference.
Hi, shareholders only get money from Administration if secured creditors get paid. If the party that buys a failed company assets or part of the assets like Lionvolt for less than the secured creditors are owed, then no money goes to Shareholders.
That suggests AMTE did not great IP - if they did then why did no-one else step in to buy them?
Thier IP at time of IPO admission is detailed in the link (much was licensed in with a large payment due over time), the trade secrets presumably are now Lionvolts. In patents ~ 90 patents licensed in with AMTE having just 1 patent application underway. True they had trade secrets around manufacturing processes and formulations and designs but they would worth a lot more if they had been proven in volume manufacturing:
https://assets.lsegissuerservices.com/original-4f731f67-815e-4f0e-ba05-23f3aacc1fcf.pdf
- protecting approximately 39 manufacturing processes and formulations and five designs as trade
secrets. It is common practice in the battery cell industry, in the Directors’ opinion, for a greater reliance
to be placed on trade secrets than in many other industries, since the cell manufacturing process
involves either the consumption of component parts or an electro-chemical or chemical change, which
prohibits reverse engineering of the original formulation;
- having licensed, primarily in relation to material formulations and technologies which are embedded in
the Company’s differentiated products, from QinetiQ and Faradion:
- on a worldwide and exclusive basis for defined fields of use, five patents and 21 trade secrets;
and
- on an exclusive basis for defined fields of use and geographies until 2026, six patents and
two patent applications;
- having licensed on a non-exclusive worldwide basis until 2025 a further 78 issued patents and seven
pending patent applications, for possible development by the Company in due course;
- having one pending patent application, directly in the Company’s name, thereby building further
protection in addition to the licensed intellectual property;
Hi, following is worth a read: https://www.insolvencydirect.bis.gov.uk/freedomofinformationtechnical/technicalmanual/ch49-60/chapter%2056-1/Part%207/Part%207.htm
The administrator owes a duty of care to the company. This duty extends to the manner, and timing, of the disposal of the company assets. Where the administrator is in breach of this duty he/she will be personally liable for any loss incurred by the company.
So that would mean FRP needs to demonstrate that they are getting the best deal for the creditors. So LionVolt in their view was the best outcome for part of the business.
So now the administrators are in on the fraud as well? AMTE failed due to a lack of funding - there are many well-funded firms looking at or making sodium batteries. Firms wanting a battery maker need a party with credible financing, a production line that is making volume now i.e. proven not potential. Chinese firms like CATL and some others claim to be launching cars with them: https://cleantechnica.com/2023/12/29/electric-cars-powered-by-sodium-ion-batteries-go-on-sale-in-china/
From Lionvolt press release "The acquisition comes hot on the heels of LionVolt’s announcement that it is building a pilot production line at the Brainport Industries Campus (BIC) in Eindhoven, the Netherlands." I read this that Lionvolt may only want the staff and factory for a short while i.e. gain expertise before switching to the local market - they would be eligible for government grants. Solid state batteries are seen as the holy grail - if they can show both technical and manufacturing progress then funding should come.
Hi,
so, where will they get batteries from them?
they seem committed to an electric future: https://media.jaguarlandrover.com/news/2023/10/jlr-accelerates-electrification-new-ps250m-state-art-future-energy-lab-0
big electrification spend of £15bn over 5 years : https://media.jaguarlandrover.com/news/2023/11/jlr-reports-another-strong-quarter-best-first-half-revenue-and-cashflow-record-0
could it be that they plan many factories?
Hi, Horis M - some funding in reality is very large compared to thier market cap. They need ~ £7 million each year to cover running costs. Say 2 years to get a production line running with sales of 10,000 EV batteries a year at £3,500 each with a 20% gross margin to break even. That comes to say £10 million as you get some sales in the 2 year period then you need working capital to buy materials to make the batteries, fund running of production line = another £10 million easily. So, an investor needs to find at least £20 million to get things running take on the patent license liability of £14 million, find customers etc. Would you inject that kind of money into a firm for less than full control?
BTW 10,000 batteries going into cars say priced at £30k each means an OEM is going take a risk on non-delivery or failure of AMTE to be able to scale of £300 million of production. So that decision will be get tons of scrutiny e.g:
1. is firm well funded = no
2. have they got a production line = maybe
3. do they have credible customers = no if looking at last 6 months accounts
4. do they have strong patent protection = a little, reliant on in-licensed IP
5. do management have a good track record = no - near bankrupt, daft location strategy for their Gigafactory
6. who is funding them - do they financial strength to support if things don't work out as planned = ?
So, I would not see a Chief Procurement Officer recommending - lets place a dependency on a tiny UK firm. Far safer to strike a deal with a major player, LG, CATL, Panasonic etc.
Oil and Gas are doomed. Tell that to Exxon and Chevron who have just each spent > $50 billion on buying more oil and gas assets. No-one thinks Oil and Gas will go away in less than 20-30 years. Even if not used for cars or airplanes then still used for petrochemical industry e.g. plastics - read and learn: https://www.iea.org/reports/the-future-of-petrochemicals
Hi, Tata will fail: In 2021-22, the revenue of Tata companies, taken together, was $128 billion (INR 9.6 trillion). These companies collectively employ over 935,000 people. There are 29 publicly listed Tata enterprises with a combined market capitalisation of $311 billion (INR 23.6 trillion) as on March 31, 2022. Yep, sounds like they don't what they are doing...best support a small UK firm that has run out of cash...
Re Germany: https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/renewables-cover-more-half-germanys-electricity-demand-first-time-year#:~:text=Solar%20and%20wind%20energy%20contributed,small%20share%20of%20geothermal%20plants.
Not too bad for a bunch of "morons"...
Hi, some Government support. Northvolt's new German factory got a subsidy (not full funding) of Euro 902 million for a planned capacity of 60GW i.e. approx 800,00 cars per year. At a 10% of that, UK would need to give Euro 90 million for 80,000 cars per year. If you take away firms that have their own supply planned e.g. Nissan, BMW, JLR etc. you don't have that large a UK customer base to sell to. Cost of fully funding a facility is going to be several times the subsidy - who is going to fund that? Also, players with credible financing already have sodium batteries e.g. https://northvolt.com/articles/northvolt-sodium-ion/
So, I'd love to see AMTE survive but if they do, they still have a huge battle to raise large cash, build a factory, scale up production against deep pocketed competitors like LG who several multi-billion deals with OEM's in addition to their own factories. Read up on Wrights Law - large makers have a huge cost advantage over new entrants.
Hi, if they are so attractive why has not someone acquired them? I suspect the fact that many of the large OEM's have their supply strategy sorted - so don't want to go with a small firm that has limited IP (read the admission document).
Re green funds - they won't invest in a firm that is worth less than typical many tens of millions - just worth their while even if it delivers a x10 gain because making £18 million is only a ~3.6% gain for a small ish £500 million fund.
As for VC's they look for a good track record - AMTE has the opposite. So that leaves opportunistic investors - many of whom may prefer to take it after administration.
Hi, 80% of worlds energy comes from Fossil Fuels. Replacing that is a huge task. As an example Tesla makes around 200GWhr of batteries per year. That's not enough to power the UK for a few days. So other forms are needed e.g. Hydrogen, Pumped Water plus others. 10% of worlds oil / gas comes from that route - so it will impact pricing.
So, you say management have little skin in the game apart from Kevin Brundish who holds 5.49%. That is not a good sign.
Hi, Re Oil is done. Maybe you missed the recent mega deals by Chevron to buy Hess for $53 billion and Exxon to buy Pioneer for $59 billion. Oil and Gas are not going to disappear in the 10 or even 20 years. Oil demand due to electric vehicles dropped by 0.3 million barrels per day last year - that's out of 100 million barrels daily use.
Hi, re Northvolt ramptastic bullet point. Europe made 10.9 million cars last year. Uk made ~ 1 million. Take away Nissan and JLR who have or are getting their own battery factories means that UK has a market potential for few hundred K of batteries vs nearly 11 million in Europe. So why would Northolt bother with the UK? No point not when they can get massive grants to build in Europe.
Hi, fund managers need to have a worthwhile stake in the companies that they invest in. For a small fund of say £100 million that means a £1 million investment - over 50% of AMTE market cap. Also fund managers are looking for evidence of an investment grade business i.e. profitable or a route to profit. Northvolt has just received a huge E750 million grant to build a battery factory in Germany. Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust has 3.5% of its £10 billion fund invested in Northvolt - started back in Sept 2020.
Re Headstart in Silicon - check out this firm: https://www.nexeonglobal.com/media/nexeon-to-begin-commercial-supply-to-Panasonic binding supply agreement and $200 million raised. Potentially upto 50% increase in Lithium battery energy density. That is what car makers want. If AMTE have something brilliant, then why are the likes of Panasonic and CATL not doing deals with them or even acquired them?
Hydrogen has few auto firms supporting it. Toyota is the main one. They have a car at £50k. Only 11 filing stations in the UK - so a lot of investment needed. EV are already selling in the many millions and when you include all cars with a hybrid mix its in the 10 of millions. So, if Hydrogen is to win it is coming from far behind.
Nissan already have a supplier next to their factory. The factory is to be expanded massively according to press releases.
So that is Nissan sorted, JLR have their site to build in Somerset - so that's a fair amount of UK car makers by volume sorted plus BMW are to speed £600 million retooling the Mini factory - supply of batteries is something they won't have overlooked...