Member Info for B2HS2L

From the AGM:

56:21 - Wilson: "How much investment will Yourgene require before the business reaches sustainable profitability."

Steve Gibson: - "This is something we are going to look at as part of the integration planning and we've only recently kicked off in the last four to six weeks.

As James (McCarthy) mentioned in his presentation, we plan to come back to investors in our trading update at the end of January to give you a progress report on how integration is progressing and also a strategic update on the business where we will cover this. But for me for the Yourgene acquisition, as James has just said, I think it's a fantastic acquisition for the business, they've got massive potential and it's great to have them as part of the Novacyt family, and I think they're going to be critical in establishing sustainable growth going forward."

JW at this point adds the following: -

"It's really a merger, - although we have taken over Yourgene, Yourgene was in revenue terms a bigger business and therefore we have been very open minded when looking at the future about different roles people will play in the business. As part of that we have invited the previous chairman of Yourgene to join the board, and we've also invited the previous chief executive - who is a very commercially orientated person - to join the board as commercial sales director."

That said, I'd like to know for sure the Yourgene cash burn since takeover.

JW bought the company for a bargain price.

Now shareholders should know how much Yourgene products/ R&D / marketing costs are actually costing.

BoD knew that investment was needed, let's see what the reality is.

IMO I think a new CEO is destined for the next deal.

1 The finances have been (and continue to be) safeguarded by James McCarthy.

2 No need yet to assign a CEO until future event(s) require it.

Whatever, McCarthy isn't JW's choice for this role.

I googled

Retrieved from Google in response to a query 'antibiotic-resistant Mycoplasma pneumoniae' :

Most Mycoplasma pneumoniae infections are self-limiting; however, clinicians routinely treat pneumonia caused by M. pneumoniae with antibiotics. All mycoplasmas lack a cell wall and, therefore, all are inherently resistant to beta-lactam antibiotics (e.g., penicillin).

+++

Is Mycoplasma sensitive to penicillin?

Mycoplasmas are the smallest free-living microorganisms, being about 300 nm in diameter. They are bounded by a triple-layered membrane and, unlike conventional bacteria, do not have a rigid cell wall. Hence, they are not susceptible to penicillins and other antibiotics that act on this structure.

Does mycoplasma pneumonia need antibiotics?

Antibiotics such as erythromycin, clarithromycin or azithromycin are effective treatment. However, because mycoplasma infection usually resolves on its own, antibiotic treatment of mild symptoms is not always necessary.

+++

Also:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK430780/ Continuing Education Activity, - Mycoplasma Pneumonia

From the above:

Prognosis

In most patients who receive prompt treatment, the prognosis is excellent, and patients are expected to make a full recovery. The symptoms and signs of pneumonia usually resolve within a few days without any complications. However, in young children, the infection can be associated with severe pneumonia, and in patients with sickle cell anemia, it may be associated with acute chest syndrome. The immunity after a Mycoplasma pneumoniae infection is short-lived.

Go to:

Complications

Even though mycoplasma pneumonia in most people is a benign infection, it can lead to several complications, especially in children and the elderly.

Hoping this helps place various media in context.

FWIW - Symptoms of present strains of Covid within this article, no mention of Pneumonia.

https://www.devonlive.com/news/health/latest-covid-symptoms-new-uk-8905155?utm_source=taboola&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=exchange

"A patient seeing benefits though would remain on treatment (at the same level) once the cohort ended. I presume."

The trial participant would be reliant upon the continued supply of AVA6000 for their life.

ie AVA6000 will have become their life support system, as otherwise they would have 'exhausted all lines of standard of care treatment'.

Is this the situation some early cohort participants find themselves in?

Dxcover - a good (Oct 2023) overview.

Dr Stephen Little Appointed Director in 2019.

https://iuk.ktn-uk.org/casestudy/drop-dry-detect-brain-cancer-early-warning-system/

Linkedin - stephen little - Non Executive Director

Dxcover · Part-time

Oct 2019 - Present

Dxcover

Dxcover is a clinical stage liquid biopsy company developing tests for the early detection of multiple cancers, when treatment has a better chance to impact outcomes.

The company has pioneered the early detection and identification of cancer employing infrared spectroscopy of circulating pan-omic biomarkers.

The company has generated compelling clinical data with high accuracy detection of Stage I and Stage II cancers. 

Dxcover is based in Scotland, United Kingdom and is establishing operations in the USA.

Website - https://www.dxcover.com/

Industry - Medical Equipment Manufacturing

Company size - 11-50 employees

Linkedin - stephen little - Director

Bioxhale · Part-time

Feb 2021 - Present · 2 yrs 10 mos London Area

Website

www.Bioxhale.com

Industry - Research

Company size - 2-10 employees

Founded - 2021

Specialties - Breath analysis , medical devices , breath sampling , diagnostics, precision medicine, Respiratory, Cancer, health monitoring , innovation in healthcare , and Future of diagnostics

+++++

Useful skills, connections and experience for someone associated with Yourgene.

Https://thepathologist.com/diagnostics/you-me-and-molecular-p

Article: You, Me, and Molecular P - Chief Scientific Officer at Yourgene Health, Joanne Mason

..."Our (Yourgene) Founder, Stephen Little"...

Source Linkedin: - stephen little - Founder of Yourgene Health - Part time Jan 2023 - Present.

Vice Chairman Jul 2019 - May 2023.

Source: - Companies House website

Director 04 July 2014, Resigned 11 January 2023

Linkedin - stephen little - Non Executive Director

BIOCAPTIVA LIMITED · Part-time

Nov 2020 - Present

BIOCAPTIVA is developing the BioCaptis, a revolutionary medical device which has the potential to transform liquid biopsy testing for cancer management, by improving early diagnosis and monitoring of disease and enhancing clinical trial data of cancer patients.

The BioCaptis captures up to 100x more cell free DNA (cfDNA) than a venous blood draw, yielding cfDNA in high quality and quantity for testing, addressing the major challenge of liquid biopsy in cancer management.

This will potentially allow the testing of a far greater number of cancer types and stages in a much wider range of patients.

BIOCAPTIVA was founded in 2021 when it spun out from the University of Edinburgh.

BIOCAPTIVA is based in Edinburgh and backed by Archangels Scottish Enterprise, Cancer Research Horizons, the new innovation engine of Cancer Research UK and Old College Capital, the University of Edinburgh’s in-house venture investment fund.

For more information, please visit www.biocaptiva.com

Linkedin - stephen little - Non Executive Director

SMi Drug Discovery · Part-time

Mar 2021 - Present

SMi is an innovative life science technology company revolutionising molecular science with its ground-breaking single-molecule imaging platform.

This transformational technology provides unprecedented AI-powered super-resolution imaging to directly observe and quantify molecules and their intricate interactions with unparalleled accuracy and reliability.

SMi’s multi-omic platform offers highly scalable throughput and flexibility, allowing the detection of a broad range of molecule types within a single test.

This unique approach facilitates faster, better informed decisions that will drive the future of therapeutic and diagnostic development.

Established with a vision to bring its revolutionary platform to every laboratory bench, SMi delivers world-class results without the need for extensive training or specialized knowledge and will transform biomedical research and diagnostics through speed, quality and versatility.

Website - https://smisystems.co.uk/

Industry - Medical Equipment Manufacturing

Company size - 11-50 employees

Https://fintel.io/i/biotechnology-value-fund-l-p

"Biotechnology Value Fund, which has a 16.5% stake in Point Biopharma (PNT), said that it was opposed to the deal."

https://fintel.io/so/us/pnt/biotechnology-value-fund-l-p

This is an overview of the increase in investment by Biotechnology value fund in Point Biopharma in recent years.

Not surprised they think Lilly's offer 'isn't enough'.

Https://www.investormeetcompany.com/investor/meeting/investor-presentation-493

Quite an interesting presentation as this was an opportunity for Allmond to mention the circumstances of his leaving Novacyt.

He bigs up what he achieved with prior companies, but according to this presentation, he never lead NCYT, and as such Novacyt has been airbrushed.

Did JW ensure DA couldn't mention the circumstances of his departure.

I doubt we will ever find out.

From todays Poolbeg RNS:

"Investor presentation

Jeremy Skillington, Chief Executive Officer, Cathal Friel, Chairman, will provide a live presentation, joined by David Allmond, incoming Chief Business Officer, via the Investor Meet Company platform on Friday 10 November 2023 at 12.30pm GMT.

The presentation is open to analysts and investors, those who already follow Poolbeg on the Investor Meet Company platform will automatically be invited."

I wonder who will spill the beans.

HC - My shelf stacker application is being processed as we speak

🤣🤣

LOL

From the voxmarket Disclaimer & Declaration of Interest at the bottom of that link:

"...Any opinions or comments are made to the best of the knowledge and belief of the writer but no responsibility is accepted for actions based on such opinions or comments. Vox Markets may receive payment from companies mentioned for enhanced profiling or publication presence."

It would appear then that Vox Markets are probably complicit in keeping the CEO Novacyt part of the Allmond CV out of the article.

It's sometimes what is omitted from these articles that really matters to interested parties such as shareholders.

BANGERS88 quote -

'For clarity I think that the research and knowledge on this forum is fantastic which is why I have been such an avid reader and visitor to the site since 2020.'

Member since 16 Dec 2021

Changes of identity usually don't bode very well on BB's.

adios pledge - please let others continue unhindered with the 'fantastic research and knowledge on this forum'.

Still hoping this bottom draw share will come good in the end despite TGF.

01:07:00 - Wilson: The Biosensors which you hoped to launch in 2024, can you be a bit more expansive of them, - I understand there is commmercial sensitivities, but surely if you gave your game away, to another company they would have to start from day one as well. So can you be more expansive on them yet?

01:07:30 - JM: I think Biosensor is a platform we're kind of playing with really. I don't know yet how commercialised that would be, I think it was part of alternatives to PCR, even though we are a PCR company so you are trying to look at your business sometimes from the outside in and asking what are other people looking at? That's part of the reason we are looking at Biosensors. Commercially I think it's very early stages. There's a lot of development to do to reach commercial scale, I just think its something for us to look at to understand what are the alternatives look like, before somebody else does it for us. So I think it's very early to give you an answer.

01:08:10 - Wilson: I think somebody in the company described it as disruptive, and the company we are teamed up with called it highly disruptive.

01:08:22 - JM: But it is disruptive, and I meet lots of people with disruptive technologies, but you've still a long way to go to be successfully disruptive. You could invent a car battery - a good example - where people say they've got a car battery that wll last, but can you commercialise, can you make it scale, can you take on the established install date. So I think the technology is very interesting, I think it is disruptive, but it has no commercial legs yet.

01:08:48 - Wilson: As you are a commercial company you would look at it to be worthwhile to go after. There's no point in inventing an egg when an egg's already there is there?

JM : - No, I agree, but when you invent a new egg it's a lonely place. You have to convince a lot of people that it's better than the old one.

Subsequently one French attendee was reminded that Yourgene was paid for in cash.

01:11:30 - No more questions, - meeting moved on to voting on resolutions.

01:03:50 - Wilson: Shareholder value has been absolutely wiped out, - shattered, - a lot of shareholders are realy looking for a lot more support from the company in terms of being more proactive possibly with Yourgene, how would you propose to go about that because we are not hearing anything about R&D as a sepearate entity. It's been what 18 months since you put out an R&D update out , I know you include parts in things - I Know its a bit of an open ended question but - if you could try and answer it please?

01:04:48 - JM: Theres a context here, - I think we went through a Covid period, I cant remember exactly, - I think it might have been 20 or 30 RNS's in a year. and I think for a lot of the retail shareholders the RNS is the eyes into the company. But don't forget RNS's is a regulatory update is supposed to be something material to the company, it's not a marketing service. I think during Covid it became a bit loud as there was so much activity going on we were literaly launching a product every month. I think what you see now is we should be updating probably three or four times a year, two of those would be results, maybe a marketing update - something like that. I don't see us going back to the frequency we had during Covid, in fact I don't think the business is moving as fast as it was during Covid. But I do get that feedback quite a lot you know. It's not like we've got all this great information we just cant be bothered telling you. The pace of the business is developing forward, it's a different business to what it was during Covid.

JW - Hopefully that has covered some of the things that might have been on peoples mind.

At this point JW invites Wilson to ask questions:

01:01:35 Wilson - What's happening with the website, it appears to be taking an awful long time to be getting re-structured?

JM - I think I have to hold my hand up for that, I think we were ready to go in the summer, then the acquisition came and we thought shall we hold back a little bit, - should we do something together, we didn't know what the other side had. It is late and it's something we need to give more attention to.

01:02:55 - Wilson: There was a £100 million (organic) prediction made over five years. Does that still stand?

JM - I don't think that's a sound figure, that figure comes from the end of Q1 2022, I think we were still a 50 million pound underlying business. At that runrate we are obviously a long way short of that right now. I think to get there without acquisitions, - it's just not credible as a number.

56:21 - How much investment will Yourgene require before the businesses reaches sustainable profitability.

SG: - So this is something we are going to look at as part of the integration planning and we've only recently kicked off in the last four to six weeks.

As James mentioned in his presentation we plan to come back to investors in our trading update at the end of January to give you a progress report on how integration is progressing and also a strategic update on the business where we will cover this. But for me for the Yourgene acquisition, as James has just said, I think it's a fantastic acquisition for the business, they've got massive potential and it's great to have them as part of the Novacyt family, and I think they're going to be critical in establishing sustainable growth going foward.

JW at this point adds the following: -

It's really a merger, - although we have taken over Yourgene, Yourgene was in revenue terms a bigger business and therefore we have been very open minded when looking at the future about different roles people will play in the business. As part of that we have invited the previous chairman of Yourgene to join the board, and we've also invited the previous chief executive - who is a very commercially orientated person - to join the board as commercial sales director.

01:00:02 - JW: Are you still actively looking for M&A targets.

JM: - The simple answer is Yes we are and we will continue to look at areas. If we can accelerate the strategy or get hold of something that is complementary we'll do that.

I don't see the acquisition of Yourgene as the end, - it's significant - and will take quite a bit of time to integrate, but I don't see that as the end of the acquisition strategy.

We now open for questions

Some considerable time expended before the start of questions (in both languages, - no questions were asked) More procedural. -

48:30 - A French attendee asked what is the progress of selling the Taiwan laboratory.

48:54 JM - I think the Taiwan business is a laboratory, it's a service lab, it's not a product business, I think it was felt that it's dependent on a number of big clients, so longer term it's just not a business thats very interesting to the group, that's why the business was sold.

50:00 - A French attendee asks: What is the update for the DHSC claim?

JM: - The claim is subject to a court case and the court case is scheduled for June 2024, and as such there are limited things I can say about the case.

We are confident of our case, we are working through the case to the best of our ability, and as and when something changes we can share it with everybody. But as of now there is no real update I can provide.

53:30 JW: - The bulk of the questions received relate to where the company is going, and we will try and cover a number of them before coming back to questions from the floor.

Does the acquisition of Yourgene indicate a change in strategy for Novacyt?

JM: - The acquisition of Yourgene was exactly in line with the strategy to diversify the portfolio which is something we stated we wanted to do.

I think it adds complementary technologies as I've just described, and capabilities, - for example the Ranger technology, with our instrumentation technology, because I think we can bring something together, so I would just say that it's a great acquisition, for Novacyt and complements what we do already.