I have say that the thought of presenting to a captive audience such as ours must have been quiet nerve racking for someone who's been in the job 3 weeks. Given that we were all hanging on his every word he tiptoed through the presentation with as much information that was at hand.
The fact that none of the applications will get the go ahead without FAA approval still provides a sticking point and to add to that there appears to be yet another step in the process.An FAA IP (Issue Paper) has to be issued laying out criteria for SMN to follow, the content of which as yet is unknown but Stephen did hint that this document was expected within a few weeks.Once they recieve that IP then there will be an annoucement of the content and what happens next.
He talked about the 2 applications, namely the wifi dome and the rear pressure bulkhead both of which will need anything between 45 & 60 sensors and these appear to be the only ones being pursued at present. He also explained that the process of installing the wifi in aircraft took Panasonic 8 years to convince the FAA to approve and now almost every aircraft has it, thats a lot of domes!
Slides were presented following the progress so far which didn't provide anything new and an update on the manufacturing of sensors appears to be going well.
The presentation lasted approx. 15 minutes and this really is just a summary so I hope that helps.Just remember that I have been in this stock since 2004 and reside in the top 20 so I can understand people frustration in the time it's taking but that's the aircraft industry for you. One thing we don't want is the same thing that happened with the Black Box saga, an Australian invention sold out to the Americans for peanuts, so sit tight.
SMN Price at posting:
90.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
