Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
I read it as 12 payments per year (i.e. monthly six figure payments). So £1.2m minimum in the next 12 months, then royalties on product sales, with the potential for ‘enhanced’ royalties from the other 11 partners. It’s a finger in the air jobby to estimate how much of a game-changer this deal is for Opti, but it SHOULD lead to massive recurring revenues without any additional overheads.
Even so, i’m disappointed we haven’t seen a bigger rise today.
But again, considering this was a long anticipated deal I have to be honest and say it wasn’t a very well written RNS. Too much ambiguity and (although I appreciate the partner wanted to keep certain details secret) it lacked the important details (royalty %s).
Let’s hope SOH is out doing interviews in the next few days to add some meat to the bones and force the market to sit up and listen.
The exclusivity part surprises me a little, as it means all our Sweetbiotix manufacturing eggs are now in one basket. Depending on how you look at this, it could be extremely positive. For exclusivity to be granted its suggests:
1. The US partner is massive and carries a lot of negotiating power, and
2. SOH is happy that the sums involved (upfront and monthly payments, plus ongoing royalties) are likely to be substantial enough to justify granting exclusivity.
I've always seen Sweetbiotix as the wildcard in the Optibiotix product set, with the potential to take the company into the mainstream considering all the interest surrounding the consumption of sugar and obesity in the media and at government level.
Unfortunately I think the market is likely to take a few days to catch up. Opti is not in fashion at the moment and a lot of focus is with the covid stocks. Hopefully we will see an uptick in trading volumes over the coming days as the market digests the news and it sparks a little bit of interest here.
Thanks Troajan. The Proactive article refers to them as a ‘new partner’, so maybe an entirely different US company from those in the previous announcements? It also clears up the link to the 11 different partners and potential for enhanced royalties.
Surely SOH will be conducting interviews over the coming days so hopefully we can learn more from those.
Thanks RyeSloan. That makes a bit more sense, maybe just poorly worded or I’m just being a bot slow this morning!
I agree, the ongoing royalty payments are the real prize here - that’s why it would be good to understand the percentages. This must be the same US company with a $10bn turnover mentioned in the previous Sweetbiotix RNS, right? So even a small royalty could mean huge sums for us.
RNS 31 May 2018:
“The company is a global brand and one of the world's largest providers of dairy products with an annual turnover exceeding $10bn.“
Or could it be from the second Sweetbiotix announcement (26 June 2018):
“The company is a global supplier of nutritional and agricultural products to companies around the world with an annual turnover exceeding $100bn.”
Although this second agreement was for six months, which has obviously lapsed now, so my guess would be the $10bn company - but, again, who knows?!
I’m looking forward to seeing how the share price reacts.
I don’t quite understand this bit:
“Enhanced royalty payments will be made to OptiBiotix on sale of SweetBiotix® products by the Company to 11 application/innovation partners with whom OptiBiotix has been in long term discussions regarding exploring the use of SweetBiotix® products in dairy, cereal and beverage applications.”
Can anybody make sense of what this means?
Great RNS and long-overdue for those who’ve been holding Opti since the beginning. To be honest I’m a bit underwhelmed by the use of the word ‘modest’ when referring to the six-figure upfront and monthly payments. It would be good to better understand How much this deal is worth to us? What are the royalty payment percentages etc.?
Like I say, after a long wait and poor share price performance recently, this will hopefully put the wind in our sales. Hopefully greater details on the deal will emerge too!
Exactly. Longer-term value investing is about finding companies that are solving real-world problems.
Here are two examples:
1) How to safely unlock from the Covid-19 lockdown in a pragmatic way, globally, to avoid economic disaster.
2) How to significantly enhance the specificity of chemo cancer treatments to improve survival rates in patients.
Avacta potentially has at least part of the solution to both of those problems.
But you've got to hold to realise the value.
It is simple. But a perceived (not actual) 'gap' in news flow also plays to the psychology of the type of shareholders Avacta now has. You see it every morning when no RNS is released. Rainbow chasers are twitchy, especially when sat on profit and with blatant de-rampers whispering in their ear.
The end of June is approx. 2.5 weeks away and the antigen test update could come at any point before then. But that is a very long time for nervous and twitchy rainbow chaser to sit on their hands and ignore the noise.
Personally I hope it arrives early to keep people on their toes.
Completely agree with this. The SP reaction to this presentation isn't a reflection on AS, the progress being made or the potential; unfortunately it is a reflection on the type of investor that has been attracted to this company over the previous few weeks and months. Patience is required here and any drop in SP has to be viewed as an opportunity.
I also think you could see that AS was annoyed by the 'fully-funded regret' question, which is a shame.
Agree regarding the UCG deal - a better alternative to no deal being done. Just quire deflating considering the value the board had originally attached to the UCG assets, which probably explains the SP drop. Also agree on the U assets, definitely not worthless in the long run. Have been expecting to see a market wide U recovery this year, but yet to happen. As long as the U market price remains low they will struggle to take advantage of these assets. On the bright side, rights issues looks more promising after the slight SP recovery this week. Maybe news on the near horizon. Bloody hope so!
The four month deadline for the Linc deal has lapsed, but no news. Would expect news on the UCG deal and the rights issue soon. Will be interesting to see which comes first.
What have they said? Issued a 'sell' recommendation?
Do you think completion of the Linc UCG deal will be seen as positive? It certainly wasn't when it was first announced - it triggered the current SP decline. Without positive news, it will be difficult to flog shares as part of the rights issue; if you want shares at 0.4p you can buy now. Doesn't seem to be many takers at the moment...
Not sure how successful the rights issue will be with the sp so low... no incentive to take up the offer at current levels. Could really do with some positive news re: uranium before the issue. They must see a future in uranium if they are raising funds to advance the current and potential other uranium projects...Despite the bleak outlook currently, this is worth a punt for the risk takers at the current sp.
Had my eye on WHE for a while and sad to say I bought in at the turn of the year. Extract from the annual statement gives a clue as to when we can expect news. "The HOA is conditional upon the satisfaction (or waiver) of a number of conditions, including: o obtaining relevant regulatory (including shareholder) and government approvals to the transfer of the Group Sale Interest o approval from the Company’s shareholders in a general meeting in accordance with ASX Listing Rules, the AIM Rules for Companies and the Australian Corporations Act, as appropriate; and o executing formal Sale and Purchase Agreements to finalise the acquisition within 4 months of the HOA Further, the parties have entered into a Funding agreement whereby Linc Energy shall provide funding up to a maximum $400,000 for the costs associated with the Company’s subsidiaries holding the UCG tenements for up to four months prior to completion of the sale transaction " The 4 month deadline from 24/02 is fast approaching. News will have to come (good or bad) towards the end of June. Maybe the BOD are holding out to complete the deal when Linc shares are at their lowest to get max value from a deal that falls well below expectations? This may well be wishful thinking and hoping for the silver lining on an otherwise dark cloud. The question should be, what happens if the Linc deal falls through?