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Following an event organised by Hardman in conjunction with Surface Transforms around 20th April 2023 participants were asked for Feedback which I readily supplied by email after being asked to highlight in ‘bold type’ questions I particularly wanted answered. I highlighted Q2 to Q6.
See below
I don’t recall getting any comprehensive response!
------ Original Message ------
From: "Events"
To “Poole”
Sent: Friday, 21 Apr, 23 At 12:18
Subject: RE: FEEDBACK ON THE SURFACE TRANSFORMS EVENT?
Dear “Poole”
My apologies on the feedback form. Please find the questions below. If you would like to respond I will collate the feedback with the rest of the responses.
Regarding the questions, please highlight any below you want further details on and I pass this on to the team.
Many thanks
Alona
My questions
Q1 Re: Operational Management. You say intending to recruit a person for the new position of Chief Operating Officer reporting directly to the CEO . Any update on making a permanent appointment? Meantime you have made an interim appointment. What are the professional qualifications of the interim appointee?
Q2 How many professionally qualified Chemical Engineers do we employ?
Q3 You have separately been advertising for a ‘Six Sigma Project Manager’. Who will they be reporting to?
Q4 It is not clear what adding each ‘new cell’ consists of? Is it principally an extra furnace or is it a complete suite of Stages 1 through to Stage 10 as shown on your web site?
Q5 (a)As an attendee last year at one of your shareholder events at Knowsley I understood that the new furnaces (Stage 3) represented a major change in the manufacturing process. In the light of recent events even before the introduction of additional cells (now due Q2 2023) there needs to be clarification as to what changes that involved.
At that Knowsley event last year, I had anticipating possible issues with making a major process change asked whether pre-testing off site was to take place. From recollection I got a short non-answer reply. Perhaps I should have been more insistent as it now appears that ought to have been undertaken. Why wasn’t it? (b)Surely if done properly it would before going live have revealed the flue lining failure rate as unacceptable.
Q6 I have also recently questioned without as yet a response whether the process diagram of Stage 3 on your website as shown would provide for stable resilient production. Does it adequately convey the processes to be undertaken at the heart of the new cells furnaces?
Pokerchips very recent comments (why suddenly no longer shown!) & those of Fevertreeman remain on the ball.
When I last commented in mid-February I said' I live in hope that they have or will very soon iron out the production problems'
I had sensed for some time that there was a lot of scrappage going on -realistically that can only have arisen in either Stages 3 (Chemical Vapour Infiltration(CVIST)) or 4 (Hear Treatment) of the manufacturing process as detailed by the company online. The company refers in communications to 'Furnaces' only with regard to Stage 4(Hear Treatment)!
My suspicion is that the principal problem area is & has been Stage 3 albeit not described online as a furnace. I maybe wrong but from the start that Stage as detailed online looks to lack suitable controls that would ensure uniformity of product through put - and hence potentially much scrappage . As to the extent of Q1 2024 scrappage is all very vague (as usual) -the amount of extra working capital (? twixt £1.5m & £2m)that ZEUS refer to in their paid for research might suggest that scrappage even exceeded acceptable production! Did it?
Frankly I have doubts as to whether the Stage 3 process as detailed online by the company is how it is now organised!
ZEUS state ' ....that in recent weeks their has been considerable success(!) achieved in recent weeks in reducing scrap' . No explanation as to how or where that has been achieved.
Pleased to see that the Chairman will be leaving -the sooner the better. He clearly did not protect shareholders by asking at the outset the right questions about the process changes as to testing & implementation that have led to the serious problems. As for the CEO he did a good job in getting potential customers on board but must hold responsibility for the production mess we got into as a result of not suitably testing and seeing the major process change was feasible and capable of working before committing us to it. He probably needs to go too.
In my last post I said that the dolling out of huge number of new share options at such a depressed share price was a disgrace -it felt like robbery.
!
There are seldom any messages here.
Any thoughts as to why the AMS share price has suddenly fallen about 15% -is the Peters Surgical deal seen as that bad?
Initial reaction to prelims & deal appeared to be positive. Where has the selling come from?
BGF/Pershing continue to add to their large holding- now over 14%- the 200k trade at 35p late on 5th March not reported until the next day reflects the 200k increase in their holding since their recent disclosure . The two largest shareholders between them now appear to hold 29.5% of the equity. It should not be too long before we get to see the preliminary results for 2023 with an update on both their cost reduction programme and progress in consolidating their databases that will facilitate their marketing of applications involving the use of Artificial Intelligence(AI).
When I posted recently I suggested that Ebiquity was around two-thirds of the way trough their cost reduction program it is probably more like half way through, and that BGF Investment Management Limited (on behalf of Pershing Securities Limited) with now around 13.9% of the equity was the largest shareholder. That is not yet the case as when last disclosed in early December 2023 Canaccord Genuity Wealth Management (with 21,793,566 shares) held 15.52% versus BGF Investment Management Limited's 10.02%. I suspect that there may be further interest from BGF/Pershing but perhaps biding their time at present! Still would be interested to know where BGF/Pershing's recent purchases came from. For me Artificial Intelligence with their own huge data bases is the future for EBQ. I would like to see them saying more to patient shareholders about those opportunities.
Further to my recent post there has been a disclosure notification by BGF Investment Management Ltd on behalf of shareholder Pershing.Securities Limited. Having recently added nearly 3% to their holding they are now with 13.9% the largest shareholder. More modest buying since then appears to be by others. Will be interesting to see where this takes the share price.. No indication yet in form of a disclose if needed as to where the bulk of BGF's additional stock came from.
WONDERING IF SOMEONE KNOWS SOMETHING. In recent days there appears to be persistent buyers both before and after some unusually large trades. No notifications yet! What are we to make of this? Incidentally, they must by now be almost two thirds of the way through their strategic move to take out over 3 years circa £5m of their cost base probably largely related to reorganising their data bases - this is likely at some stage soon to be augmented by moves to incorporate AI into their product offerings Is this what keen buyers have their eye on?
I live in hope that they have or will very soon iron out the production problems. A few months back there was a suggestion that there were teething issues in several areas tha were being attended to. That was largely a red herring.
I still think that the real issue is do they have the main furnace problem solved? Otherwise they need to let us know how they are able to forward order for further furnaces required?
As to their recently dolling out huge numbers of options at the very depressed they have caused it was a disgrace. The go ahead for the new options was given by shareholders when the share price was closer to 50p!
To me shareholders are being robbed.
How on earth the two main shareholders have continued to put up with this also needs some explaining - I have to agree with most of what "fevetreeman" has to say. The Chairman's job is too look after shareholders interest by asking the right questions which he appears not to have being for several years now. As for Johnson he failed to see that the major process change was feasible and capable of working before committing us to it. Enough said
Having recently added a few shares to my holding was pleased to see the appointment of a Sales Director to beef up their Translogic business unit where their product portfolio is now well placed to gain impetus under his leadership. Surprised that this announcement has not yet produced more buyers at this level.
NEWS UPDATE: AVINGTRANS MEDICAL ACTIVITIES (Magnetica & Adaptix together!)
Magnetica Limited
Chicago or bust! Our team is in the air and preparing to converge on Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) 2023 in Chicago in just a few days!
We would love for you to drop by our booth to enjoy some treats and chat about our much-anticipated high-field MSK extremity MRI system. Our prototype system has travelled all the way from Australia and will be available to view from day 1 of the exhibition.
We will be alongside our friends from Adaptix Ltd, and you can visit us at booth number 3141.
Found it impossible to join Zoom meeting - were we meant to have been supplied with an ID? Tried to contact Hardman but they don't seem to have a phone number!
Why on earth did they send out their report today just ahead of the proposed meeting rather than a day before?
As regards the report very little that is of any real help as to the production problems and whether they have been permanently solved. I am now wondering what the company had to say at the meeting about the issues. It is still not clear whether the main furnace issues are in Stage 3 or Stage 4. The website refers to 'furnace' at Stage 4 but all the earlier stuff was about relining the graphite which would suggest Stage 3 albeit is not described by them as a furnace. Perhaps it is problems with both? Hopeless communications with shareholders.
The NED's have badly let shareholders down as they have access to any information they needed but seemingly never asked the right questions when they should have done. They deserve the boot.
This was compounded by executive and senior management apparently being out of their depth as to the feasibility of and the management of the process of untested technical change in their manufacturing process.
At this price circa 15p they may well be able to raise new money but they may l need to be much more convincing than of late that they do actually have a firm hand on matters. The alternative is a bid from some source that can deliver the goods and as a shareholder one can only hope if it gets to that state that there are more than one interested parties.
On this forum there is plenty of discussion about order book and new capacity building plans. The share price however will be nowhere near where it ought to be until it is clear that the present manufacturing process is under control and able to produce at its intended output without lots of poor quality or wastage at the same time. I need some convincing that they now have a process that if scaled -up the new equipment will be reliable. If they don't then how do they know with lead times what equipment to order? For me the reports on getting on top of manufacturing issues have been vague - and insufficient in relation to what is needed to provide assurances. I have noted that they suggest that customers are sufficiently assured as to progress on some of these matters. Is it not overdue that shareholders were also similarly kept in touch?
Recent Announcement (see link below) worth looking at regarding the use of the Transense Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) technology as having been accepted by the US Army for use in their T901 engines. This suggests possible follow- on from only use with helicopters.
https://www.army.mil/article/270499/first_t901_engine_accepted_by_the_army_for_future_attack_reconnaissance_aircraft
Responding to recent postings(by Guitarsolo & Fevertreeman).
Not long after I acquired as a long term investment in SCE shares in early 2022 I attended a Capital Markets Day at the company's HQ & factory in Knowsley i April 2022.
As a chartered Chemical Engineer with some experience with furnaces early in my career I was particularly interested to learn about the production process as a whole but had some concerns about the change that was planned for the production process and at the open meeting I asked management whether the feasibility of the new process would be tested prior to installing it on-site as I thought it ought to be. I recall clearly that idea was quickly Poo-pooed and passed over. I much regret now that I was perhaps too polite in not questioning their response.
It led me on a subsequent occasion when problems with the new process became evident to outsiders to contact the CEO personally by email to be informed on his behalf by a colleague of his that I be would be getting the CEO's response. None was forthcoming. Again I should have followed it up but did not.
The damage to reputation is now evident and It appears that no one outside the company (except possibly the sellers who meantime maybe helped by leakage of information have driven the share price down) reliably yet knows what is going on. I could put it more bluntly but it is about time we did.
After recent support back to around 200p why the setback today? No RNS announcement ahead of this.
They are in good shape financially only thought is have they a large acquisition in mind that the market is aware of? Otherwise are their forced institutional sellers?