Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
EAN live, here's an article on pricing: https://paxex.aero/2019/03/short-haul-wifi-pricing-emerges-for-british-airways-ean-service/
The Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) in London today handed down its judgment dealing with ViaSat’s challenge to Ofcom’s January 2018 authorisation of Inmarsat’s UK complementary ground component (CGC) forming part of Inmarsat’s European Aviation Network (EAN). Inmarsat says the tribunal comprehensively found in favour of Ofcom and Inmarsat and determined that all of ViaSat’s arguments failed. On that basis, the Tribunal dismissed ViaSat’s case.
Would think it's likely Inmarsat is a strong contender for bids to build UKs own satellite network post the Galileo decision.
And this in the face of Viasat's objection. First news on EAN for ages, pleased to find something positive.
Jamie - I would highlight the various bank's coverage and SP predictions, and question how they built their views/models given how static the company's guidance has been. In particular I would highlight Numis Securities and what drove their analysis, and question whether they had any undisclosed interest in the outcome.
KernowCash - Why would you expect them to be able go on the acquisition trail? It seems to me that if the dividend is cut it will be because of cash flow pressure, which means there will be no extra cash for acquisitions either surely? I remain puzzled by this share's price. As an amateur looking at the financials it is easy to realise that in the short-term the dividend at its current level is at risk, but even if it were cut by 50% that would still be a decent yield at current price levels. It also seems to me that ISAT's cash flows are resilient (mostly long term contracts) and underpinned by significant infrastructure (satellites), so I struggle to understand a scenario where the dividend is suspended altogether. Finally, as mentioned in the quoted article earlier - the CEO/CFO come out extremely bullish in the commentary and really come across as understanding their market, which is in start contrast to the analysts current view.
I'm just venting, it's remarkable how this company gets its price slashed in a rising market for having its dividend "at risk", while Amazon trades on a 300 PE, has never paid a dividend, but keeps making new highs. The answer of course: supply and demand, but the question "why the demand" is much harder for me to answer in a rational way.
My best guess is The Times write up this Sunday parroting the Numis negative commentary and giving an Avoid recommendation nudged the share price down. Tomorrow will be interesting me thinks. Outcomes from here look polarised to me. Going to hurt if it sinks.
But here is some good news, fwiw. http://www.satellitetoday.com/telecom/2017/10/26/inmarsat-deutsche-telekom-demo-ean-integration-flight/
Not much reason to buy until it goes ex-divi, as you'll just get 2% returned back to you in a few weeks less admin fees.
It's worth paying attention to why the short sellers have taken their positions. As much as I like the management team and am holding my interest in the company, I think it is taking a bet that the EAN goes live and rapidly becomes highly cash generative, and maritime does not see further negative impacts from global economics. It's not a certain bet, and the clock is ticking for additional revenue before the dividend runs into serious headwinds. I'm holding because I think first mover advantage for airline broadband over Europe will be a crushing long term advantage. If that doesn't happen, it won't be pretty me thinks.
Transcript of the results conference call can be found on seeking alpha. Personally, I am as impressed as I can be (for looking in from the outside) with this management team. Apparently strong operational control, and their insights into their strategy suggest a deep and nuanced understanding of their business and marketplace.
Does anyone have any concrete evidence that Ilika will benefit in anyway from Toyota's solid state battery program? Yes, they have done work with Toyota, but I see no evidence in any of the RNS announcements (and I just reviewed the full available archive) that the tech that Toyota is using is in anyway owned by Ilika. All the solid state battery announcements re: patents etc reference the small stacked batteries they have developed, which I don't think is the same beast as the work they did for Toyota. i.e. I think Toyota own 100% of rights to all the car related battery tech. Would love to shown to be wrong on this front.
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1331646 Assuming above link is redacted by moderators, Google "ilika eetimes" for a useful article on I'll ika battery outlook published 26 Apr 17. Good news: CEO saying the right things about their engagement with relevant industry players. Bad news: CEO saying 2-3 years out before commercial adoption of solid state battery tech. So I expect to leave shares for this one in the bottom drawer for quite some time, and expect furthee dilution / funding asks before IKA cash flow turns around.
Not expecting this event to positively move the share price, but good to have the risk behind us.
While I remain a fan of this share in the long term, my basic technical analysis leads me to think that we will see 600p, having broken through long term support in the 660-680p range.
I did some digging around last night and I think the drop on the 18th is likely due to the FCC seeking comments on a granting a waiver for the use of Galileo satellite navigation system in the USA. If my reading is correct (not my area of expertise at all), it seems likely that acceptance of the waiver would result in Ligado's bandwidth allocation request getting rejected. Where exactly that leaves Ligado isn't clear to me, but my best guess would be "Up the creek..." Re: US infrastructure spend: not clear to me at all that telecomm would benefit from this move, as Trump appears to be distinctly old school when it comes to infrastructure (think roads, rail) and has expressed no view that IT/comms infrastructure is a priority for his administration.