It's really simple, lots can go wrong. The company's own announcements allude to one of the potential risks.
The next iteration is expected to produce wafers that will beavailable for analysis during Q2 2019, barring any unforeseen equipment issues.
Specifically, the risk here is not meeting timelines. Any delay, even just a week or two beyond what the market is expecting will send the share price south, obviously longer delays or announcements confirming delays will have a drastic impact on share price. The company is very good at conservatively navigating timelines and appears to meet or exceed their own expectations, an exceptionally positive point, however what they are doing is complicated and highly technical and thus very much still exposed to this risk. Furthermore, the market is NOT perfect and IMO demonstrates that it is actually very stupid. You don't need to look beyond this company or forum to find so many posts from people complaining that (20-Sept-18) sell off was due to the company's failure AND/OR not informing them about the need for multiple iterations with IMEC. The reality is there was no failure and the company's own announcements had previously stated that IMEC would be producing the "first" set of wafers due sometime around of after when they actually did. The market and rah rah brigade only wanted to hear one thing, we have made the chip, JDs going be making his biggest deal ever, you are all millionaires. Obviously, reality got in the way of peoples greed and delusion, nonetheless, it demonstrates how little patience the market has for missing timelines, regardless of whether they are real or just fabricated through a lack of research.
Multiple risks exist around performance characteristics. The company's own website lists them as Yield, Speed, Endurance, Retention. My interpretation through research is that they are basically listed in order of importance. The previous announcement stated that endurance is excellent and the cells can manage millions of cycles AND retention analysis showed the best results the Company has been able to produceoutside of its own facilities. Endurance results are excellent and from my research and understanding, millions of cycles is more than what is required, however endurance is NOT the most important factor here, albeit great results. Furthermore, the retention announcement is meaningless to me, as from my understanding this is the first time they have produced the technology out of their own labs, so therefore it would be the best by definition. One caveat, perhaps I have this wrong and HGST have produced something outside 4DSs own lab, invalidating my statement.
Most importantly, yield and speed need to be replicated on the 300mm wafers IMEC are producing. Without an acceptable yield AND speed result, there is no marketable product. So, that leads us to where we are right now, producing and analysing multiple variations of D17 wafer, in order to produce yield results that are commercial AND replicate the characteristics they have demonstrated in the lab with regards to speed and I assume maintaining or improving on endurance and retention characteristics if possible.
Assuming this is done successfully AND on time, they then move onto producing the MB chip, which is where I assume the real yield statistics and information come from, the part that really removes risk and when we see the share price rise. So, in reality, IMEC & 4DS still have a significant amount of work to do, if this wasn't the case, the share price would be significantly higher than it is now. Having said all that, I do believe we are massively undervalued at 7c - 8c and the stock is a massive value buy at this point. Should the company continue on its current path and produce great results in shorter time frames with the yield, speed, endurance and retention characteristics they are aiming for, I strongly believe the holders will be smiling from ear to ear and some of the traders will get lucky and some will be burnt.
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