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Wow. Shots duly fired. I think BIVDA would be entirely justified to release a statement warning the government and Sir John Bell to “stop lying and try harder to validate the tests properly.” They are like kindergarten students trying to review a PhD project.
At least this might draw the disagreement into the open and command more public attention, in turn encouraging more of the facts to come out. People love a good ding dong.
In 2021 there was a “Business Update” on 24th Feb. But in 2020 a year-end “Trading update” was released on 23rd January. Before that the reporting year ended 31st July, and trading statements were put out in the first week of August of 2016/17, but 2018/2019 had business updates in October.
So there’s no clear precedent, but we might get a trading update any time this month. If not, then in Feb or early March at the latest we should have a business update or preliminary results, hopefully with some numbers for sales in H2 2021 that would put to bed this idea that there are no AffiDx sales.
Of course then people’s complaints will be “the sales should be higher”, so perhaps they will wait for positive updates on Meduflow before putting out any backward-looking update.
It was confirmed in AS’ presentation on 30th September that the manufacturing run rate with GAD/GAH was c.1m per month at that point. Given Bioserv seem to keep selling out and a large order was placed with ABDX for post-TT, there’s no reason to think that Avacta haven’t been selling around 1m per month for the past few months. If making £1/test, a year of sales would be offsetting almost half their 2020 losses. Not insignificant.
The trading update should give some indication, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see a significant jump in revenues over the comparative period. 4 months at 1m/month, maybe £4-5 per test (price to reseller or bulk orders) and you’re looking at maybe £15-£20m revenue. Granted, cost of goods will eat a lot of that, but it would show evidence that they’ve been quietly shifting the product.
What was it someone said the other day about the Nomad wanting to switch to quarterly trading updates? Speculation, or any basis? The 1st December update did set a precedent of reporting one month at a time. Would make sense to have first few months individually before any switch to quarterly, and then advise the market that’s what’s happening at the point of switch. Just want to make sure I haven’t missed something.
Yep, of course the UK market is pretty irrelevant to the investment case at this point - thanks for keeping us on track sdon. However, there remains a lot of justified anger out there at the government’s treatment of UK diagnostics. I see a lot of people shouting about them not supporting our diagnostics industry, and wanted to make the point they’ve a lot more to answer for than mere lack of support.
Sure, that all makes sense MCB. To paraphrase a great thinker: “Never ascribe to conspiracy, that which can be adequately explained by incompetence and subsequent arse-covering lies.”
But the continued reticence to even approve tests for private sale in the UK, let alone public provision, is pure market distortion.
Part of me wonders if it’s all aimed at currying favour with the Chinese ahead of attempting to strike a trade deal.
Regarding the profits, there was the issue of the guy responding to Neale Hanvey saying “I don’t think profit is a dirty word”.
But not all profits are morally equal. The trouble is the current profit for many dubious covid contracts (such fraction of it as lands in the UK) is concentrated among a few individuals connected to the Tory party, with no benefit to the wider society. Profit for a British PLC benefits hundreds/thousands of British workers for that company (and it’s suppliers), as well as myriad shareholders, not just one or two private individuals who happen to be connected middlemen, rather than having done anything deserving or worthy.
At the end of the day, they don’t have to support British by buying British. The Chinese could have won by competitive tender. Look how many other things in the Uk we get that are made in China.
But the issue is what looks like deliberate obstruction of the UK industry, such that the playing field isn’t level:
- Moving goal posts with regulation
- Inadequate and inflexible test validation at PD that favours inferior tests
- Regulatory delays in approving British tests through CTDA
- Promising contracts to the likes of NCYT and ODX such that they invest to meet those contracts, then cancelling them.
- Withholding payments to NCYT and ABDX
This is what amounts to active sabotage of the UK diagnostics industry, not merely lack of support.
Regarding the fact it would have been “wholly inappropriate” for AS to give any details on 30 Sep about how the trial was going, in this case there was probably an overlay of patient confidentiality, which trumps market disclosure rules. Even though we don’t know the patients’ names, there will be people out there who do. Until there are enough patients to anonymise the results statistically, I don’t think any details can be released (without express consent?).
Once there are sufficient results to release at a stated milestone (end of a phase for example), there is some leeway in when they would be released (up to a few weeks?), to allow sufficient time to analyse, QC and report them appropriately. Similar to financial results, you don’t want to make any errors at all.
But I’m also relatively new to biotech investing, so don’t take my word as a given.
Ooh, a sudden **** drop - taking out a stop loss at 0.3p?
I think Mr Market is likely to wake up vigorously on MOS when the next trading update with the first month of Brazil figures lands. Just shifted in a few more funds, although I missed yesterday’s bargain.
Seems like it’s a double swipe at the government, Eastside, saying not only have they ballsed up the chosen strategy by screwing over domestic industry and climbing into bed with the Chinese, but in the author’s view, it’s the wrong over-arching strategy at this point anyway.
I don’t agree 100% that it’s time now to move away from widespread testing, but surely we’ll have to in the long run. But I think the habit of using LFTs is so ingrained now it’ll take a few years to subside to lower levels - even in countries where people have to pay for tests, they are doing so.
Thanks for posting, quercus. A decent article, surprisingly critical of the government for the Telegraph. Mounting division between Boris’ lot and traditional conservative media?
There was also a school of thought that suggested Brexit would allow us to set our own internal market rules “for the benefit of the nation”. And another school of thought that says the world is flat.
But I’m quite sure that the responsible individuals in our government are doing very well out of ordering Innova tests, even as our country and its industry are not. So who are the fools?
Per 30th September presentation, AS said an update on initial AVA6000 pharmacokinetic (PK) data will come “towards the end of the year, into Q1”. So I’d hope for something this month, but there’s wiggle room up to end of March. Plenty time before then for the LFT picture to become clearer, albeit AVA6000 PK data could come any day.
And then we should be able to expect more complete results and progress to dose expansion by end-Q2. I’d guess there’s potential for covid slippage if the hospitals really do get clogged up this quarter, but I think they seem to have found better ways by now for other treatments to coexist with a constant intake of covid patients.
Really excited on both fronts, tbh. Beats thinking about being back at work. ;)
Thanks for posting it, Grufell, much appreciated. You know, you can reply to the first post to get them all in one thread?
Touk,
What you call ”realism”, I call a perpetually changing negative narrative attempting to sow FUD. Before 22/12, it was “We need HUA and we’ll never get it”. Now we have HUA (or more specifically, a CE mark for self-testing) and the global demand for LFTs is going through the roof and unmet by supply.
And we’re supposed to believe it’s realistic that Avacta/Medusa19 won’t sell anything because nothing was announced between Christmas and new year? As if any real business ever happens in that window... This CE mark was a genuine game changer and I can see that you and your ilk are trying to undermine it before we even have a chance to see what comes of it.
I appreciate constructive challenge and debate, but your agenda is becoming increasingly clear. To the bin you go.
Medusa will do some deals with businesses, but per the RNS’s and previous presentations, most of the really big deals would be via Avacta directly.
Although, if it’s true that Medusa19 are bringing their own capacity to the party, and given that they were pivotal in securing self-test approval, perhaps they will be involved in large volume deals.
They know how to sell stuff, relax. Now that the reliance on third parties is hugely reduced, the Medusa sales team can get on with doing their thing. And history suggests they do it well.
Seems quite a lot of negativity on here this weekend. I suspect cynical traders or lackeys of the shorts, trying to fill the void between the CE Mark and the announcement of meaningful sales with meaningless BS. Won’t be long now.
The word on Twitter was c.45-60 days from 9th November. If true then that places it 24th Dec to 8th Jan (if calendar days), or 12 Jan to 01 Feb if it’s working days.
But it’s unofficial hearsay at this point so take with a big pinch of salt.
And if that’s
MattD, good find. We did see that a while back. Based on the URL I’d say it went up in September 2021! But then sales would have had to stop when the CTDA thing came in.
*Joined jimbo