Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
Given the presentation and directors' commentary back in August, any lack of positive news - ie sign up of at least one tier one client providing additional revenue in the £millions at the least - will be a credibility hit for the board. In such circumstances, you would expect, at the least, an update of some sort this side of Christmas to advise shareholders of the situation.
Having said what they said back in late August, I think they have to get at least one tier one player on board, with a significant positive monetary benefit, before Christmas. If they don't then I think the board's credibility takes a very serious hit.
Spot on JDF7 - all the positive news, sentiment, and promises in the world won't help the business if it cannot monetise its technology.
I await the much hoped for Tier-1 sign up RNS due in Q4 - followed by, I would hope, a trading update showing rapidly increasing revenue early in 2024, ahead of FY results normally announced in early May.
Djmmac, don't know the numbers of shares, but -
Mirriad was founded in 2015 : Listed on AIM in 2017 - at which point is was valued at £62 million mkt cap : It raised money in 2018, again in 2019, and in Nov 2020 : Earlier this year through another placing it added 210 million shares in the placing bringing the total number of shares in issue to 490 million.
Just a word about the past share price given it has been mentioned in some posts. The share price has indeed been much higher, but there are a lot more shares in circulation after the placing earlier this year increased that number from 280 million share to 490 million. So 30p pre placing equates to maybe 16/17p now.
Mind you, 16/17p would be very nice indeed. The shares were listed on AIM at 62p back in 2017 (before other placings before the most recent), and actually peaked at 63p in April 2021. That was on the basis of the potential in the Mirriad technology.....
Yesterday's presentation was impressive - and I think it clarified some key points. Microsoft are clearing assisting with the technology, while it seems unlikely that there's any prospect of a commercial link with Amazon. That should be borne in mind by anyone looking to either trade or invest.
It was also the first time that I've seen the board / directors outline a scale of financial opportunity. Good to see as 1) it helped clarify my thinking, and 2) I would have thought that there would not have been any such outlining had they not thought it a realistic scenario.
As per other posts, I hope for some positive RNS over the next few months. Milestones for me would be 1) confirming the sign-up of a tier one provider before the end of '23, 2) the appearance of programmatic revenues, 3) providing a boost to revenues. If this is achieved, then it's easier to see how Mirriad might grow in relation to the scenarios outlined yesterday.
Yes, my invitation to subscribe to the new share offer came through yesterday, and I accepted the offer (5 new shares for every 21 held at 3p per share) this morning. This is the open offer after the placing was completed last week.
On the financing side the attitude of the 9 institutions who collectively held / hold 68% of the shares must be key here ? I would have thought the collaboration with microsoft should have increased their confidence that Mirriad's technology can indeed be monetised in some way - whatever that may be - and that they are therefore more likely to continue to support the business. I think the microsoft collaboration de-risks the cash burn issue to a degree.
In the past couple of years May has been the month in which Mirriad has announced its FY results. Last year 11th May, year prior 10th May.
Given the frenzy of the past few days it will be interesting to see if they keep to this schedule, or delay. And if they do announce, you would expect some updates alongside the results.
Makes sense Mountainous - Mirriad is a punt in my view, but one that could be significant indeed. It's why I'm a shareholder.
The technology / IP seems to be excellent, the problem to now has been that it has proven too difficult to date to monetise it, hence the cash burn and the ticking clock to Q3 this year.
If they could re-finance / re-capitalise they give themselves that much more time to monetise the tech. That would also give the BoD more leeway in any subsequent discussions over a possible sale of the company.
What I'm not sure about is how a re-finance might be acheived / what shape it would take. Getting on for 70% of the shares are held by 9 major players, mainly institutions. Do they provide more funding for a larger stake in the company hence diluting other shareholders ? Rights issue maybe ?
To be honest I doubted any sale process would generate interest at a level that the BoD thought they could accept. After all, if you're a company that is interested in Mirriad, the principal reason for that interest is the intellectual property - and given Mirriad's cash position, why buy it when you might be able to pick it up for a song after Mirriad runs out of cash and goes pop ?
Mirriad's technology has a lot of potential - the problem has been the time it has taken to try to monetise it, and getting to that point still seems some way away. Meanwhile the cash burns. Given that, I imagine there are some players who are waiting to see if it does go pop, and then to pick up the intellectual property for very little.
I suspect the board has ended the sale process because they got some pretty cheap offers that didn't appeal. I think the hope is that the large shareholders agree further funding (maybe as part of a cash raise involving all shareholders) to give the business more time - putting it in a better position without the cash clock ticking so loud, and maximising the opportunity to monetise the tech.
I don't know the details of this, but as per the document that announced the strategic review on the 20th January, "the strategic review will be undertaken under the mechanism referred to in the Takeover code as a "Formal Sale Process"."
I guess this has driven the requirement for lots of forms 8.3 and 8.5 documenting shareholdings and transactions.
I really don't know, the technology has clearly got something that would be of value to the right partner, but given the rate of cash burn the clock is ticking - and I guess that weakens the board's position.
In my mind, for a capital raise to be successful there's got to be some realistic prospect of monetising the tech in the next 12 months to an extent to where there is a viable business. Not sure that's a likely prospect.
A business looking to acquire the tech might wait until the cash runs out and pick up the intellectual property for a song ? Or maybe for any number of reasons they'd pay something to acquire it. Whatever, given a mkt valuation of only £4.5 million, it wouldn't cost a big player much.
As always DYOR.