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LordVM, you would not want to know how much research I’ve been doing into this over the past few weeks. I’ve not posted anything, which will annoy some, as I’ve not had any concrete info. And I didn’t want to spam the board with everything I found as a lot of it has already been published by Kooba and others.
Basically, I’ve been down a lot of rabbit holes!
All I am certain of is that our dots are in the VD55G1, due for full production release about now. The SWIR sensor our dots are in doesn’t seem to have a name yet.
Kooba, I guess they could point to previous guidance, such as the half-year results, in which they told us that they had been told by ST to expect more orders.
In terms of an 2nd order influencing the SP, I think we would need to know a lot more about the order than they would be willing or able to publish. I.e. if they don’t provide much or any detail half of the investors might jump for joy and the other half might say they expect it is probably a small order. So I’m not sure it would move the SP much at all. Personally speaking, I am 99.99% convinced that Nanoco will receive follow on orders from ST but am 0.01% sure what the size of those orders or our profit margin will be!
I am assuming Nanoco doesn't have to publish an RNS each time it receives more orders from ST for the two types of dots? Or would they have to say something if the order was significant?
If they don't have to send more RNS's about follow on orders I guess we won't know more until they maybe say something in the commentary on the unaudited preliminary end of year results in October, or possibly in the year end trading update in August?
Indeed. They only spent £36k on share buy backs yesterday. Doesn't look like many people want to sell at the current SP I guess. If yesterday's levels were to be the norm going forward they will be buying back shares until mid-July.
Agreed. If the daily volume keeps trending lower the company would have to reduce their buys or the SP would drift upwards II assume. Good for the company if it's levelled. However, I'm not guessing what'll happen from here over the next 1-3 months. I'll just keep watching ST like a hawk and listening out for company announcements. I'd be quite happy if things stayed dull and level in the short term. What will be will be.
Your interpretation is probably better than mine. Yeah, I’m keeping tabs, it’s £1,100,763
Averages say that would last another 26 days, but that’s not a good indicator as their bb rate has slowed down, so it is currently likely to last longer than that. But It’ll be what it’ll be I guess.
Kooba, can you check my maths pls. Since the buyback started I make it that the company has purchased 5,302,431 of its own shares. Total trading volume in that period has been 20,803,398 if I remove the double counting as you say.
So, I make it the company is buying back an average of 25.5% per day. Albeit that jumped over 50% in the 2 days before they had a pause. Since then they are buying back at half the rate but today that would still be 40% of the total. Have I got that right?
With the overall volume of trades trending lower they will need to reduce their BB's further or they would go above 50% again if that trend continues.
Daily trading volumes have dropped steeply over the past 2 weeks and are now below average. The company buy backs are bang on 20% of all trades since they started on 11th April. Maybe a 20% average trading volume is the logic Cavendish are following.
But even after halving the buy back rate recently the company made up nearly 28% of all trades yesterday. So, does that indicate stock liquidity might be drying up which would mean the company buy back rate would have to reduce further to avoid pushing up the SP? Genuine question btw.
I don't think we should understate the news about - and potential impact of - our 2 new NEDs. Dieter May joined the Board in February. Dr Jalal Bagherli joined 3 weeks ago.
Dr Bagherli was CEO of Dialog Semiconductors, leading to their $5.7B sale to Renesas in 2021. He led the negotiation of a $600m licensing deal for transfer of IP and resources to Apple; raised significant funds in European capital markets and completed numerous acquisitions totalling over $1bn. He's also co-chair of the UK Semiconductor Advisory Panel.
Dieter May was Chairman and CEO of Osram Opto Semiconductors GmbH, one of the world's leading optoelectronic components companies, participating in electronics applications such as facial and iris recognition, health monitoring, vehicle navigation, and virtual and augmented reality as well as uLED displays
These guys have vast experience right at the top of multi-billion dollar companies, with a broad range of industry contacts and expertise in different market sectors.
Anyone want to speculate why these guys would want to spend any of their time advising our itty-bitty company that is only valued at £15m above current cash levels?...
I still don't get why a handful of people on this BB spend so much of their time and effort posting negative comments, or replying in agreement to other negative comments, about the company, about the management team and about how the lessons from the past tell us we should steer clear of investing here as they expect the SP to tank soon. Wouldn't you find somewhere else to invest your money and time?
I can only conclude that they actually do believe in the company prospects!
Those people are trying to set the narrative by coming up with "logical reasons" the company mcap should be lower, which they then use to then tell us what the SP "should" be. But we all know that it's the SP that determines the mcap, and the SP is dictated by supply and demand - so ultimately it's quite largely based on sentiment or optimism. The mcap was getting on for £150m above cash when we were working with the US customer when we were only in the initial stage of product development. Why? Because investors could see the potential...
My optimism has been increasing the more I've been digging into the prospects, and I couldn't see some of the stuff I found had been shared on this BB - or certainly it hadn't been shouted about as much as I would have expected.
Kooba, all valid points. I should say the 5 year cycle is in reality quite a bit more than that and we know Nanoco were working with ST as part of the supply chain for the "major US customer" from 2018. I believe they've met all milestones and the dates haven't slipped, but we investors aren't exactly the most patient people. We all want news and we want it now!
Watching colloidally grown lead sulfide quantum dots dry in an industrial fab environment has tested my patience at times... Think I might go and buy a drone with NIR capabilities to while away the time..
Kooba, annoyingly you keep beating me to it each time ;-) I've been reading through all those papers and others - I also found no mention of Nanoco in any STM tech specs. I didn't see that as a bad thing. Nanoco have developed a component material and have their own IP. STM use that component material and have built it into a quantum film with their own IP. Two different products. These two companies seem to be working well with each other and have done for many years. We investors focus on the daily SP and half-yearly and annual results where I think the real value is in the 5 year super-cycle of developing a new product, where there seems to be confidence that there will then be a market for that product. This is what I meant when I cryptically said we've been concentrating on the finger instead of the moon...
We know the process of putting quantum dots on silicon isn’t unique to ST, but that they are the only ones who are investing in producing them at scale for mass market devices. It’s not that they have been investing years just to develop a new technology – we know they’ve been investing in being able to reliably produce that technology at scale for the mass market. We were told that already by BT. ST have been building an oil rig...
We also know STM built an additional 300mm fab in another country, i.e. more than one oil rig to meet supply demands of mass market adoption (not necessary just of these sensors of course)..
It's difficult to do but I've had to step far back to before 2020 to see the bigger picture and to look at the progress they've made working with STM. Doing that has been like watching a snail move using stop motion photography! So I feel positive right now. And we've not even talked about the 2nd customer / partner we've also been working with for years... or the 3rd one they told us they hoped to sign in H1 2024...
But putting both feet back on the ground, it's about turning that all potential good stuff into profits.
LordWM
I hadn't finished my analysis so didn't and don't want to set hares racing. I found a few likely candidate sensors but was looking for ways to get more confidence before posting anything. And I didn't know if what I found was old news to this BB. No time now for me just now and looks like Kooba and others have also done a lot of digging into this - perhaps way more than me.
But I've definitely been seeing green shoots, and maybe on a day that will finally dawn!
Yeah, I didn't recall whether anyone had already called out "ST’s new VD55G1 is sampling now, with volume production slated for March 2024" but presumed it must have all been covered before on this BB. Been researching specs of all ST sensors and possible end users / collaborations but not expecting to find "the answer".
Found some other stuff of interest, again could all be old news to you or this BB. Again, excuse the pun, trying to join up all the dots. Clearly lots of market potential even with gen1 sensors. Been going through iphone roadmaps, and how sensors behind the new punch hole design are being testing in iphone 16 but not expected to be included until iphone 17 in 2025.
Which got me thinking that gen2 dots won't be available by 2025 so maybe, just maybe, it could end up with sensors with gen1 dots in...
And then i got to thinking that I need some sleep.
I'm certainly not suggesting they had any information prior to the tender that wasn't in the market. I just wonder if they are, excuse the pun, sensing some good mood music. The research I've been doing recently provides me with optimism but I can't put thoughts on paper yet and it might be nothing you don't already know. Anyone got any tea leaves?
Troublesome
You are right, investing in Nanoco for so long has been a rollercoaster ride for us all and many times I've felt sick and wanted to get off.
I'll give you my honest opinion. I think BT is doing a good job. I think the Samsung payout was the right result for the company, but I wasn't happy about the communications in advance.... And, let's just say I really wasn't comfortable when ME sold his shares when he did.. So, I might be optimistic now - more than I've been for a long time - based on everything I'm hearing, but it's not blind faith and I'm prepared to be critical of the company at times.
Kooba, without wanting to sound combative, I wonder it could be seen as confidence by the company its own near term prospects. They've been making positive noises for quite a while now, and yes we've all got the scars and have seen a lot of false dawns. But after many years working with STM developing materials that have finally reached production maybe they are feeling confident that there will be positive news in the coming months.
Something that I spent a lot of time thinking about before the tender was why they would have been happy with / endorsed their own Financial Adviser and joint Corporate Broker Cavendish's bullish forecast prior to the 24p tender. I couldn't get my head round the timing. It felt I was being talked out of taking 24p as the forecast was much higher - albeit I know broker forecasts are usually optimistic. So.. I considered they might have been covering themselves, i.e. the tender genuinely was a premium to the SP at that time, but if positive developments followed they could rightly say they guided the market to expect good things...
But as you know I'm an optimist!