Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
Rudey, It makes greater impact if newspapers uses the extreme case from WHO. While you could just infect a group with COVID-19, the risks are just too great for the volunteers and it would be difficult to justify ethically (not saying a country will try this though). That is why a safe variant of COVID-19 is generally used. See the Mail which compares the two approaches from Imperial and Oxford being considered.
"The science behind both vaccine attempts hinges on recreating the 'spike' proteins that are found all over the outside of the COVID-19 viruses.
Both will attempt to recreate or mimic these spikes inside the body. The difference between the two is how they achieve this effect.
Imperial College London will try to deliver genetic material (RNA) from the coronavirus which programs cells inside the patient's body to recreate the spike proteins. It will transport the RNA inside liquid droplets injected into the bloodstream.
The team at the University of Oxford, on the other hand, will genetically engineer a virus to look like the coronavirus - to have the same spike proteins on the outside - but be unable to cause any infection inside a person.
This virus, weakened by genetic engineering, is a type of virus called an adenovirus, the same as those which cause common colds, that has been taken from chimpanzees.
If the vaccines can successfully mimic the spikes inside a person's bloodstream, and stimulate the immune system to create special antibodies to attack it, this could train the body to destroy the real coronavirus if they get infected with it in future.
The same process is thought to happen in people who catch COVID-19 for real, but this is far more dangerous - a vaccine will have the same end-point but without causing illness in the process."
My understanding is that a challenge model's value is that the volunteers are only exposed to a mild form of the virus . COVID-19 ids part off a family of Covid viruses that include the common cold. Hence, it is meant to be relatively safe as they will only take on healthy volunteers and they will not be exposed to the full covid-19 but one of its variants that gives symptoms like the common cold. Not sure of the exact science behind this but not sure the Telegragh had got its reporting 100% correct
TW1111 thanks for the link as I wasn't aware ORP were attending. I am not a fan of the foul mouthed TW but ORP sponsor his podcast. I suppose it is better to have hin on your side; a necessary evil.
GG1111 - I am not aware of any presentations today and it is not on the calendar on Open Orphans web site
There are 3 presentations this month on the 11th, 14th and 28th
See https://www.openorphan.com/investors/key-dates-calender
CF is a good salesman and comes across very well. He is open about his intention of selling the company within the year and I am sure he will have no shortage of takers. Even without COVID he would have have doubled or trebled the value of the company from such a low base. It was just ripe for consolidation and stripping out overheads from both businesses and even with a modest utilisation of their valuable assets, the combined entity can be a very profitable services business. With COVID-19, the upside is even greater and will generate great interest in the company. I see a takeout price of 20p plus.
Plus if he spins out Open Orphans share of the Universal Flu into a separate entity that will be an additional extra done prior to any sale. He hinted at this in a recent podcast.
archiles Binx is one of Bravehearts portfolio companies and this means that it typical has a much lower shareholding that its 6 strategic investments (lowest GYROMETRIC SYSTEMS 19.5% and highest PARAYTEC LIMITED 100%). From looking at companies house, I think it is around 0.36% but their share structure is complex and lots of shareholder so probably best to check for yourself.
Their are lots of interesting companies in the portfolio investments see
https://braveheartgroup.co.uk/table-of-investments/
For example Dimensional Imaging whose imaging technology is used in gaming such as Call of Duty see https://www.di4d.com/
However, I view these portfolio investment more as lottery tickets if one of them comes good. The real value is in the strategic investments.
That being said it would be interesting to add up the value of all the investment that BRH holds. Even without the speculative nature of its COVID test interest they would probably justify the current share price. It is far from a one trick pony and that is one of the reasons for my long term investment in the company
GG1111 it is at 5pm on the 11th May via Sharesoc
see https://www.sharesoc.org/events/sharesoc-webinar-with-open-orphan-orph-11-may-2020/
You need to sign up to Sharesoc but you can opt for the free membership but to be honest it is worth supporting Sharesoc as it is only a small annual fee.
Could there be a bidding war for #ORPH ? They have the scarce resources of a COVID challenge model and a quarantine facility needed to accelerate the development of any antiviral drug. Small change for a large pharma in the race to be first.
LB28 the dividend was a one off via the sale of its Viking fund management unit.
As mentioned previously not impressed with Alan Green. He doesn't carry out adequate research and falls apart even under mild questioning. I don't understand why he thinks it would be a regular dividend.
Rachelsdad, Your questions have raised other questions so thanks for raising them.
I noticed that BRH paid for the remaining share in Paraytec using 995,186 BRH shares in Oct 2019. In the previous year Paraytec was looking to raise £4m and BRH said that it wouldn’t take part because of its already significant shareholding (42% at the time). Looks like the equity raise didn’t happen but in the latest BRH accounts it says “Paraytec continues to operate profitably and with positive cashflow.” So a number of questions, Why was the fund raise no longer needed? It did spin out Sentinel but I can’t see that generating much cash. Secondly, what has happened to the BRH shares used to buy out Paraytec. Maybe, some of these have come on the market and have helped increase liquidity. Lastly, on the newly launched BRH web site it says BRH only holds 50.77%. I assume this is an error as it should be 100%. Can anyone help?
That notice of raising of £4m in funding from Paraytec was from October 2019 and I don't think it ever took place.
Subsequently, BRH bought out the remaining shares in Paraytec.
In its last accounts BRH says "Paraytec continues to operate profitably and with positive cashflow. "
I am sure Paraytec is one of the many targets for BOU and getting shares in a quoted company or cash would realise value for BRH. However, if it cash flow positive, I suspect that BRH thinks that there could be better value down the line keeping it independent.
wow, over 9.4m shares traded today out of a total of 29.73m. Give the small free float (33% - 9.9m approx), there must have been a lot of day trading going on. Normally, this would be very dangerous given the normal poor liquidity but today was not the norm. As the shares find more sticky long term holders, any good news will have a dramatic effect on the upside.
wow - what happened - used the placing as an opportunity to top up £10k worth this morning at around 19.2p, thinking it might dip further but since difficult to buy in quantity, I went ahead and took a longer term view. Long term is now only hours :-) Now have a substantial holding for me and happy to sit on it.
Agree on potential of the cannabis market application.
The irony is that P2F are generating majority of cashflow from non core activities like making sanitizer. However this useful cashflow will reduce the need for a fundraise and permit investment in their core technology where there seems to be several promising markets. However given their name, they are betting on the agriculture sector which I believe is correct. That being said , they seem to be hedging their bets in other sectors perhaps by utilising some of the research resources at the universities.
Looks like Swablebar is from Ireland and he is referring to mainland UK
Worth listening again to the proactive interviews with TB and some of the personnel from the strategic investments.
I love Trevor Brown’s comment in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22pS6R78DUI
when he refers to the 6 strategic investment as having 6 horses in a race and hence no competition, one is certain to win, perhaps two if there is a tie. He outlines the absurd valuation given to BRH by the market and led me to add whenever I had spare cash.
In the same video Gareth Cave from Pharm2Farm is impressive; he highlights that the agricultural industry is just one of the many applications of the Nanoparticle technology. Others sectors being medical and electronics.
there is a list of portfolio companies on the new BRH site, but not sure which are still current.
https://braveheartgroup.co.uk/table-of-investments/