Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
@Crow2, I acknowledge your post which was earlier than mine! I think my questionn is subtly different although
I hope people will forgive me for prefacing this post by saying I am in the completely udecided group about whether Samsung will settle or not. My question here may sound related but it is only tangentially so. I don't really want to encourage the continuation of the debate as I don't think any of us can really know. What I am wondering is to what extent (if at all) people think Samsung need Nanoco for further development in the area of QDs. If we assume S now have (via whatever means) N's initially and important discoveries, what about subsequent discoveries which may lead to much better non cadium QDs? Do people think S have the expertise to run with it from here on their own or might they need Nanoco some time in the future when, say ,N produces much better QDs and sells them to Samsuns's competitors? Is that likely? unlikely?
StakeAndAle, I'm not so sure. I looked at the record of various other pre-trial conferences. They generally seem to be published a week after the conference finishes - so maybe (?) Friday 26 ish - not today. I think that at that stage we will learn a few things like the judge's ruling on the in limine motions etc, but I don't know that we will learn a lot at that stage. Seems to me for the next month or so we have only four key things to focus on about the litigation: (1) is there a pre-trial settlement and if so its details, (2) does the jury find that Samsung infringed one or more of Nanoco's patents (the more the better as prob more difficult to appeal muliple infrigements ) (3) If S infringed did they do it wilfully? and (4) the monetary sum and other details of any compensation awarded (if any). Of course win or lose other issues will then arise, specifically: the judge's post trial report/decisions and the whole set of issues around if and what Sappeals there are from S or possibly N.
Thanks for your replies Basscadet and HenryHistorian.
I have been thinking about how I should expect the Nanoco SP to behave if we win or if we lose, so as to prepare myself for the decisions I might take when the time comes. Maybe I'm just filling in time while I await real news but I'm not sure if making snap decisions at the time without any pre-thought has always worked well for me in the past. My difficulty is that I think the SP will be determined as much by sentiment as by Nanoco's possible award or future prospects. So for example we were near 180p when the prospects were just vapourware. So if all goes well I can see the possibility (no certainty) of a really big spike well above this past high followed by a later subsequent fallback which might be slow or sudden, followed by a more gradual move to reflect the company's true future prospects. So in this case I guess my aim would be to sell some into the spike (not all because I hope Nanoco's long term prospects are good). Of course timing is notoriously difficult and I could make a right pig's ear of it. If we lose I wonder whether the SP might be hit really hard , much harder than warranted if the organic growth strand still looks good. So maybe it could drop as low as 10p (or less) and it might then make sense to buy more. The company after all is now a two-trick pony and disaster in the first trick might not mean a complete disaster providing the second trick goes off well. Of course as a LTH if hope is dashed again on both strands I don't think I would be in a mood to give it another chance. I'd be interested what others think about the various senarios.
"... validating our products in H1 of FY23, ahead of expected visibility of production orders shortly thereafter. "
I hope this doesn't indicate that our customer will only place orders if we win at trial. I understand these orders are for different mterials, but maybe they (whoever they are) fancy their chance at stealingl the new IP if we fail in Texas!
Looking forward to the possible organic growth, has anyone any idea who are potential customers for the new materials are apart from STmicro? Indeed are we absolutely sure the first out of the blocks for Nanoco will be STmicro?I notice STmicro has a conference coming up "STMicroelectronics is eager to welcome you back to our first in-person, hosted event in the Southern California area since the COVID-19 shutdown! The ST Technology Tour is where experts will present on a variety of electronics technologies in markets poised for rapid growth in the coming years. Join us in Newport Beach, CA on August 25th to expand your knowledge and network with your peers, while experiencing new technology demonstrations from ST and our partners." https://content.st.com/technology-tour-2022-newportbeach.html
According to Google the 5 year high is between 54p and 55p! I wonder if we can break this soon (pre-trial) or whether it will all be too much for the poor old SP!
I can't remember anyone defining how a small award or a large award are defined in this context. I'm not even sure whether if it is a large award the funding partners will get 50% of the first part of the award and 20% of the rest of the award or just 20% of the whole larger award if the award is 'big enough'. There must also be some sort of sliding scale depending on the award but I suspect that is commercially confidential. Overall I think we can probably only say, they will get a fairly big sum of money, and Nanoco will get the rest. So it is not possible for us plebs to even judge the effect on the share price of a particular size of award yet. At at some stage I assume we will get to know how much Nanoco gets (assuming we win of course). This info may however not be available for some considerable time due to appeals etc and the fact the exact figure may only be deduced after the appropriate end of year accounts are produced. I am hoping for a significant re-rate of the SP if Nanoco wins at trial but I don't expect the picture to be clear for several, or perhaps many months after the trial. Do others expect the picture to be clearer sooner than that?
You are forgetting our backers get a sizeable chunk
Don't forget if there is a deal only worth a few hundred million then Nanoco would probably have to pay about half of it to its litigation backers. Thus the worth of such an agreement to Nanoco would only be maybe double it's share price maybe less, especially as the current share price is probably artificially high based on the chances of a litigation award. I fully realise I am probably in the minority but I think N would be daft to settle for anything less than a billion and I would hope (but I admit not expect) double that maybe more. I can hear the laughs from some people as I write. Ha Ha. The proof will be in the pudding.
Unless an agreement is suddenly reached, is anyone expecting any significant litigation news before the trial? I'm not! I would have thought we have now had all the key pre-trial decisions and info. Although the SP may move up, down or sideways I suspect we now just have to be patient and wait for the trial result before any really big move (unless an agreement is reached of course) ... then the judges deliberations/decisions etc. ... then the appeal, if any. Even if everything goes in our/Nanoco's favour I'm not sure when the SP will reflect what we believe is the true value of the company. Obviously we also have the possibility of good/bad news relating to the organic business which could itself be transformative in terms of value..
@Grezz, Tenner is our CEO, Brian Tenner, also called BT on the board sometimes.
Hawi, It was a clumsy attempt to change the topic of conversation!
The trouble with talking about a potential settlement is that we have such little information about what Samsung might be prepared to offer and what Nanoco might accept. We can guess of course but I'm not sure how useful/accurate that would be or what evidence we could provide to support our guess. I do wonder though if Samsung might be prepared to accept a medium level damages model before trial if N agreed to drop any notion of mark-up for their actions being wilful. Maybe being found by the court to have acted wifully would be something they would want to avoid. Or then again, maybe not.
I have no personal knowledge about this but some other posters have suggested that if the judge multiplies the potential amount by the maximum (times 3) this may paradoxically mean Samsung would have little risk in appealing any decision. Whereas a factor of say *2 means appealing could result in the factor being increased to 3. So would Samsung be as likely to risk it? Or do we think if they lose S would appeal any adverse ruling anyway? Time drifting by and although we stand potentially to gain or lose we are still just powerless bystanders watching this all play out. GLA.
I am watching the dates on the list Hawi gave us in one of his posts as they go by. Two more dates occur this week:
- August 9, 2022: File joint pre-trial or (joint proposed jury instructions, joint proposed verdict form responses to motions in limine, updated exhibit lists, updated witness lists...)
- August 12, 2022: notify court of agreements reaching during meet and confer: parties are ordered to meet and confer on outstanding objections and shall advice the court of any agreements reached latest by 1 pm.
Not sure whether we will learn the outcomes of these things, or if we do whether we will be able to gain much clarity from them, but the lights are dimming preparing for the curtain to go up. I feel I should order my popcorn. It will probably be stressful and exciting at the same time. I'm hoping for one of those feel good movies in which the good guys win and the badies get their well deserved come-uppance. Hope I'm not in the wrong room and have to watch a horror movie!
Remember if some bought a millionsomeone else (or possibly several others added together) sold a million.
Colin has been hinting about phase 3 for ages. Few believed me when I said this earlier. It really shouldn't have come as a surprise to anyone , so it seems strange to me that the reaction now seems so strong. As for admitting the 2MT or whatever, this is difficult to call as it may not be in Xtr's interest to trigger the AA buyback condition until after phase 3. Maybe we are short or maybe Colin doesn't want to take any actions or release any information which may definitively prove we have the 2MT . I have no idea, but I suspect with the delay the SP will remain under significant pressure until something major happens. Even if Colin/other board members made a major buy I have suspicions that this may just provide temporate relief. my guess is those with major shareholdings here will have to wait a while before they become multi-millionaires
We can always hope but I don't think we should put too much weight on his being a specialist in settlements. He seems to have a wide experience in patent litigation cases. Let's hope Nanoco's lawyers can handle any of these many well paid lawyers that Samsung have, but we will have to wait and see. True justice and legal decisions are not always the same thing.