Member Info for Okehurst1

MB,

There is no news of ongoing government trials of the Visitect Antibody test anywhere ?
Colin has not disclosed/ updated of any such trials unlike the RTC Public Health England trial.
It’s not part of the RTC - as a test

As part of UK Government strategy for the antibody test it looks to me that Visitect is not part of it and without MHRA approval or a Government contract it’s not going to be a winner in the UK.
It then becomes a slog to sell into the commercial market place without a badge of approval by the Government - MHRA

We know the RTC test is being sold commercially for £16 and it’s now being shipped to Iceland as an example, there will be a discount to the U.K. government but I don’t think it will be more than around 20%

So we then look at Omega’s cost base to manufacture their element and this is where you and I differ .

The frozen design will come to Omega as one and they will manufacture the complete test, head to tail , as will the other members of the consortium, the base cost to produce the test will be in the region of £2.50 maybe £3 tops - it’s the packaging am not firm on.

The test is then sent to CIBA who handle distribution from their end , it also looks like Abingdon deal with the Government on the Administration side.

As it’s a consortium the pricing pressure is not quite as in say a free market, it suited the two USA companies to have a UK manufacturer in the consortium and CIBA from Switzerland were brought in so they could control pricing.

We had the debate a few weeks ago and I didn’t think the consortium would be via an SPV it just wouldn’t have worked , I don’t think I am going to be far out with the above either, gross profit per test will be much higher than £1 from RTC .

Good debate and let’s see how it unfolds

MB, good debate.

What do you think the sale price / gross profit will be on the RTC test?
Ditto Mologic antibody ?
Do you think Omega will enjoy double MHRC status for both tests ?

What’s your take ?

Safy,

I wonder if the Mologic antibody test has been quietly put to one side ? We know the margin on that test.

The RTC contract looks a much higher margin, Omega focuses its manufacturing capacity on this Test, £3.60 Mologic vs potentially £13 less Abingdon / CIBA handling / admin costs

Gear up to 10M a month as Colin suggested alongside him also eluding to expanding manufacturing capacity.

It’s coming together, potentially big revenue numbers here.

It’s a consortium and Omega is an equal partner
There is no SPV it’s a straight forward supply contract ,this includes UK Government and to others - be that Sovereign states like Iceland last week

The commercial price we know is £16 per test and we believe via other RTC members it’s £13 to the UK Government.

We have decent idea on cost of the test / with packaging of £2.50, we can assume Abingdon will charge a handling /Administration Fee, 15% would be fair.

Then Omega keep the rest as an equal partner.

As Mologic ltd is a private company little is disclosed of their financial posistion, however they are required to file accounts at Companies House, listed below is a snapshot of their performance.

It’s fair to say they were a small business 10 months ago with sales of just £3M p/a , they do not on the surface have a manufacturing/ engineering base to the scale of Omega, as such we can understand why they there not invited into the RTC, they are not a manufacturer of note.
It appears they are focusing on IP .

Mologic 2019 snap shot

2019
Sales £3,113,623
Cost of Sales £1,173,531 - -
Gross Profit £1,940,092
Wages & Salarie £3,455,960
Directors Emoluments £336,786
Depreciation £552,583
Audit Fees £6,000
Interest Payments £61,376
Pre Tax Profit
Tax £247,899

‘Patients with less than seven days onset of symptoms showed a higher viral load, and sensitivity for rapid antigen test (86.5 %)’

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/344727361_Panbio_antigen_rapid_test_is_reliable_to_diagnose_SARS-CoV-2_infection_in_the_first_7_days_after_the_onset_of_symptoms

Sillies.

With one paragraph you have nailed it.

Yes good find

The £10m upfront for the RTC for components that was announced week before last will probably produce a further 10M tests on top of the 1M the week before that.

It’s coming together for Omega

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/health-and-human-body/human-diseases/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker-how-they-work-latest-developments-cvd/

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/hope-for-covid-vaccine-at-new-year-25b52b86s

Sleepdave,

Fair comment, but Omega’s test has undertaken and passed an independent PHE managed trial and it’s appears the results were excellent and possibly there is a peer review underway
Alongside that N 1M people will be taking part in a trial managed by the Government , it will be interesting to see that data - one day

Put the above aside ,there are two other elements at play for Omega

It appears that Omega ltd is the only UK domiciled lateral flow engineer within the RTC, the other partners operate in the U.K. through a wholly owned subsidiary company and we know what happens to corporation tax with that structure
So politically it looks good having Omega in the mix and there are no other peer manufacturers of note in the U.K.
At least the U.K. government can recoup the Corp tax easier as and when.

The other point which kind of follows on from above, the U.K. just doesn’t have the wider skill base in the diagnostics Engineering industry and it’s in the national interest that we have at least 1 home grown provider.

So yes you are correct there are other LFT providers out there but none tick all the boxes like Omega do - as we both know as holders of Avacta as well as Omega, Avacta don’t manufacture LFT’s

Omega is in a good position here.

Twatcher, with respect your not measuring like for like

The Abbott BinaxNOW test requires a piece of kit - it’s a digital card - it’s Swob based and not self administered
Plus it appears it hasn’t passed the Government’s minimum performance criteria- bit more digging to confirm this latter point

Our order is not being dragged out as you stated ,the Government have just funded £10M for components and the RTC will be sending out 1M tests -initially - that have also been ordered.

Valneva have only just entered stage 3 trials and are nowhere near gaining approval, it’s not a relevant comparison

‘ Valneva will produce a total of 190m doses of its experimental drug VLA20001 — if the vaccine development proves successful — at its facility in Livingston’

Simple1 , your making yourself look stupid

To help you with your research , the Abbott test needs a machine and a medical profession to administer it’s not a POC self administered LFT , home test providing a result in 15 minutes .

Unvrkw, agree, that’s my take.

Just the timing of the Antigen tests which Omega will manufacture be that for Avacta or Mologic, either way it’s looking doubtful either will be produced in mass this side of January 2021

So if the Government agenda is mass home testing to the run up to xmas without an input from a Laboratory then it has to be mixture of LFT’s via the RTC which is the only POC / self administered test that has successfully completed public body trials (PHE) coupled with disclosed upfront cash payments for components to the RTC , it’s also fair to say that after yesterday’s news the Government will take all their available manufacturing capacity.

Into January 2021 it’s possible the members of the RTC be that collectively or independently increase capacity to take on board antigen tests .

Omega are in a good position to maximise their engineering skills, there will be a worldwide shortage of quality LFT’s .

He’s made a public apology, he got it wrong it’s been accepted, no need for it to be rubbed into his face on his own Twitter feed every day for the world to see.

It’s worth researching Avacta to understand where they are today and how is it relevant to Omega.

They don’t have a test out there today and their CEO is saying they have not completed clinical trials and at the earliest it will be January before any tests if they are successful are on the market.

Everything being relative you say ‘you are heavily invested here ‘ suggest you do some research to see what your are
‘ heavily invested ‘ in and then cross reference the science of antibodies vs Antigens and manufacturing / engineering skills of the two businesses.

The Avacta test has not been validated as yet, it’s still in clinical trials at Porton Down according to the companies CEO, it’s nowhere near being ready this side of Xmas he advises.

There is only one 15 minute test POC / self service test being mass produced that can offer an accurate Covid 19 test which has been developed with Government support /money and passed their performance criteria ,it’s the RTC ABC - 19 triple antibody

Further validation below, this is Omega’s time.

https://twitter.com/dhscgovuk?lang=en