The latest Investing Matters Podcast with Jean Roche, Co-Manager of Schroder UK Mid Cap Investment Trust has just been released. Listen here.
Thanks for the share. I'm no scientist but the key part near the bottom: 100% specificity!
@Ophidian - can you take a look and tell us what you think too?
== LFD test result ==
The Affimer-NP based LFA detected recombinant CCHFV NP in spiked sera from horse, goat, sheep, cow and human. No cross-reactivity was shown when testing these sera spiked with negative control NPs from other bunyaviruses (Fig 6A–6C). At least 10 negative field sera samples from each animal and from humans were tested, and none gave false positives, demonstrating a 100% specificity of the LFAs for CCHFV NP under these conditions.
== summary at end ==
The Affimer-NP based LFAs presented in this study require minimal specimen processing, have time to results of minutes and are suitable for field testing and low-infrastructure settings. The high thermostability of Affimer-NP allows its immobilization into the LFA membrane, which involves a baking step at 45°C, and suggests such devices will be robust in the field. This is a remarkable advantage of Affimer reagents, particularly relevant in low-resource settings where refrigerated storage of diagnostic tests may not be possible [33]. The use of Affimers as detection molecules also provides additional benefits due to their low production cost and consistent batch uniformity. In our hands, these tests present 100% specificity for CCHFV NP and their LOD is 15 ng of recombinant CCHFV NP/strip. There are no previous studies describing the LOD needed for LFA devices to successfully detect CCHFV NP in acute patient samples, nor reference antigen preparation standards for hemorrhagic fever viral NPs [34]. But different types of point-of-care diagnostic tests have shown the ability to detect hemorrhagic fever viral NPs in virus isolates and patient samples, such is the case for Lassa virus [35], Ebola virus [36] or RVFV [37]. In order to determine if the sensitivity of our current device is sufficient to detect CCHFV NP in real patient samples, it will need to be experimentally tested and optimized using patient samples under high-level biosafety containment. Nonetheless, the results presented in this study serve as proof of concept for the use of Affimers in LFAs and represent the first prototype point-of-care diagnostic test for the detection of recombinant CCHFV NP in sera described to date. These findings represent a possible starting point for the future development of Affimer-based diagnostic assays for the detection of CCHFV NP, contributing to the preparedness for potential future outbreak scenarios.
And this too - more detail about new distribution partnerships.
Avacta has already put in place one distribution partner for the direct-to-consumer market (Medusa19) and will put in place additional distribution partners for the healthcare professional/work-force testing markets, as well as OEM partnerships in order to maximise the commercial opportunity.
Just waiting for them to close the PrimaryBid. For reference, OPRH closed their 11p PB placing by 9am but that was a 1st come 1st served basis. This is going to be scaled no doubt, but I cant see them keeping it open til 4pm.
Make sure you check the box saying you are an existing shareholder.. There should be preference when they sort out allocations
"The Company currently expects that preference will be given to the Company's existing investors."
Avacta had previous worked on a % royalty of future sales with its prior Affimer deals (AffyXell, LG Chem). This time, they are going looking to keep a much bigger piece of the pie. Signing a distribution deal with Medusa highlights this as they intend to have their own branded COVID-test, not just selling the Affimer reagents to Cytiva to sell themselves (but they may sign a separate non-retail distribution contract with them). This all means higher profits, and re-emphasises that they are very positive on the likelihood of success of their test.
To do this they need the capital to actually ramp up the production themselves, and the details of the RNS highlights this. They are hiring personnel, ramping up production facilities, and they expect strong near-term newsflow on their test.
The stock is already recovering, so the market is liking this placing. There are other companies that have done placings at terrible times/prices (GDR, SAR), but Avacta is not one of them. Re-read the outlook, a keep the faith!
=== OUTLOOK ===
The ongoing development of COVID-19 antigen tests, including a saliva-based lateral flow test strip, requires the expansion of the Group's research and development, and production facilities at its site in Wetherby to meet the anticipated demand for Affimer reagent production. The Group is also growing its senior team in the diagnostics division to include regulatory affairs and product management roles, and expand the commercial and technical teams to support the development and commercialisation of the COVID-19 test and its wider product pipeline.
The Group will grow the therapeutics development team in Cambridge and add further clinical development resources to support the transition of several Affimer and pre|CISION therapeutic programmes through preclinical development into the clinic.
The Board anticipates strong near-term newsflow relating to the COVID-19 test developments with Cytiva and Adeptrix, further commercial partnerships to exploit the COVID-19 Affimer reagents and from ongoing commercial and technical progress in the core therapeutic and diagnostic businesses.
Problem with NCYT is that there is a lot of competition for molecular PCR tests. The prices they are receiving for their tests are dropping too and if you look at the price action from their last few RNS.. always sold into despite the good news shows many investors are taking profits (if any left) and moving on.
Good thing with AVCT is that there is really no competition (apart from SONA) for their rapid saliva tests and still plenty of news/collaborations to come, not to mention the LT cancer treatment angle. NCYT I'm afraid is always going to be a medium term trade at best.
Some of you might know that Aptamer Group were working on a rapid COVID-19 test with Paraytec and the University of Sheffield. Yesterday Braveheart said in their RNS that Aptamer were no longer working with them, but no reason given. Not sure what to make of their withdrawal, but I do remember we had comparisons between Affimers and Aptamers, and why Affimers are better.
== BRH RNS - 1 June 2020 ==
Further re Paraytec Limited
Commencement of the project to develop a COVID-19 test with the University of Sheffield
Further to the announcement dated 6 May 2020, the Company announced that Paraytec Limited ("Paraytec"), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Braveheart, was in discussions with the University of Sheffield and Aptamer Group plc to define a project to develop a rapid test for the pandemic pathogen, COVID-19. These discussions have now successfully concluded, and the project will now commence with Sheffield University, but without the involvement of Aptamer Group plc, today.
He is watching.. He just liked a tweet by @BigBiteNow in the last hour..
BBN
@BigBiteNow
·
1h
Remarkable how many in this market, given how sensible they feel themselves to be, still feel it more necessary to tweet than actually research what they are tweeting about.
June's the biggest month in #AVCT short life. A great many positions have been taken for far less.
The RNS reveals all.
** SALES AND ORDERS - increasing by £30m in May **
2 June: Therefore, currently the total sales and confirmed orders are €135 million (£120 million).
29 April: Primerdesign has sold, received orders for or has been contracted to deliver over £90 million (€103 million) of its COVID-19 test.
** MANUFACTURING CAPACITY is minimum 4m, maximum 8m in May **
29 April: Novacyt announced plans to increase manufacturing capacity to approximately eight million tests per month. The Company is on track with this scale-up and expects to achieve at least this level of output during June 2020.
15 April: Primerdesign has now achieved the target run-rate of manufacturing its COVID-19 test at a rate of four million tests per month.
So, taking the minimum capacity of 4m, then adding the 1.5m Zimbabwe order, gives average price of £5.45. Using a higher manufacturing capacity of 6m (my estimate) or the unlikely 8m, the average price would be even lower. A lot of people were running figures based off £8+ per test, so this is a quite significant reduction if so. Note you have had tweets from PrimerDesign in the last few weeks saying same day shipping on orders - therefore one can infer that they are not selling everything they make anymore. All in all, I'm not as confident as before on this stock.
@ShearClass I don't estimate 8m tests, but 6m midpoint. Even if you take the lowest level of 4m tests produced and sold in May, that still gives an average price per test of £5.45 (£30m/5.5 tests). Still a big drop versus the £8+ earlier.
I was expecting higher than £30m increase for May. Only reason I can think of is that pricing must be weaker. Zimbabwe order is 1.5m (tender so probably needed to lower price to be competitive) while manufacturing capacity I estimate at 6m (was ramping up from 4m to 8m in May) means average price was £4. That's a massive drop from previous £8 levels.
Hopefully this is only a one off month just to win the Zimbabwe order, but need to keep an eye on pricing going forward. I have 10m tests @ £6 going forwards atm, which means market at 330p share price is pricing in sales through to November.
If we think our test will be widely used (as in daily, at place of work, before entering a stadium/flight), I'm sure false negatives won't be a big issue as it just merely means the viral load is below the Limit of Detection. The person will likely test positive at a later point once the viral load is above this LOD.
Even at 80% sensitivity, someone with the virus getting two consecutive false negatives (20% x 20%) is 4%.
The real question is at what viral load is transmission of the virus happening? Remember people are typically only getting tested when symptomatic, but we know asymptomatic people are also spreading the virus.