Ann: Mesoblast Update on COVID-19 ARDS Trial, page-151

This will be my last post as I think a lot of people will be hurting today but looking back on MSB with "20/20" vision I suppose where this ended up whilst a surprise.....can be seen with signposts along the way.

1) The MSB team consistently demonstrated a tone deaf attitude to the release of market announcements and crippled themselves needlessly on a few occasions. Whilst that wouldn't have changed the final results it would have changed where the price was (upwards in my view) when those results hit. The communications team has consistently been amazingly poor.

2) Silviu over the course of time had failed to map out a coherent and focused strategy until about the year 2017 I think maybe 2018 when I believe we had new guys on the Board of Directors who ditched certain products we were considering and focused in on a small bunch of candidates.

3) The fact we had to buy Osiris's previously rejected technology in order to get a "near term win" spoke to the unfocused approach of Point 2.

4) Silviu whilst being a brilliant scientist whom I believe wholeheartedly has done really stellar work was simply not well cut out to deciding how the company should progress. We had a totally scattergun approach which wasted a lot of money and a lot of time.

MSB realistically should have had some of this stuff resolved 2-3 years ago now and potentially 4 if you want to stretch things. I remember back in 2014-2015 many posts on this board were talking about how the next "12 months" is when it all comes good. And every year it was always "the next 12" etc.
MSB was unfocused

5) And finally the biggest complaint I have with MSB. Their trial design has consistently been horrible. They have set end points that in hindsight have crippled the company and end points that are just stupid when compared to what they were trying to achieve.

Also TEVA bailed out. Whilst yes thats probably just me casting stones for any old reason but having a big almost Tier 1 Pharma bail out on CHF early in the piece was a concern then.......and I guess it seems evident why now. Although I freely admit they perhaps bailed due to unrelated reasons (like cutting portfolios they don't want to focus on etc) but still. Looking back it seems like a signpost.

We've had brilliant posters like Stockrock and.......ecool? We've also been haunted by the contrarian Madamanswer in times past.

All contributed brilliantly to the discussion even Madamanswer and he likely won't show up to chime in but he did say something that I think will stick with me.
Yes its great to get in on a stock on the "ground floor" long before its success is proven as you will make yourself a TON OF MONEY. However there is still LOTS of upside in waiting until a stock is "approved' and getting in then. Because at least at that point you know you're riding a sure thing.
Sure you miss out on the early huge gains. But your also going to miss out on the "omg I'm broke what have I done" losses.

I think for science/biotech companies I would never touch another one as an investment until such time as it had an approved drug.