Certainly wasn't trying to be flippant. As I understand it, which is very little if at all, the founding shareholder thing has been going on for years. Probably since the company was founded. I know nothing about its origins, how or why it came about. I do know it requires resolution. I don't think that's absurd. Nor do I think we're voting for whatever the board want in order simply to maintain harmony moving forward. The point I was trying to make and seem to have failed miserably in doing, was simply that any organisation is stronger for being united in a common purpose, without the distractions of long-standing unresolved potentially divisive disputes between majority sherholders. Other than the first pay rise AS has had in five years, there is no cash component being handed out. The company is not being bled dry by a greedy CEO. This is all performance/incentive based, past, present and future.
I know my views on this are different to yours and I guess many others, but in the bigger scheme of things, it's small beer. Nor do I see the dilution as a problem. I think it's factored in already. I also think, for a variety of reasons not the least of which being the current market turmoil, that there's a huge disconnect between the current SP and what has been achieved.
The news we are waiting on from Gerresheimer and more importantly finalisation of the production agreement with SA in December should go along way to correcting this. I think there is still a (misguided) belief in some quarters that because the SA deal is not yet set in stone it could still fall over. Taking an extremely cynical pessimistic view, fair enough. Possibly, in some unforseen circumstance it could fall over. In my view it won't.
We have all seen it before - we have an MOU with blah blah blah and we're negotiating in good faith blah blah blah and the future is going to be awesome blah blah blah then it never happens. That is not the case here. The good faith is backed up by a five year collaboration backed up in turn by a 10 million Euros up front license fee, itself backed up by the first "good faith" milestone payment of some $3 million before the final agreement itself is set in stone. How much more pure good faith do you want?
With regard to the money from SA. The license fee was an exclusive one-off non-refundable payment to secure the rights to the technology. The company can do what they want with it. Working capital. The milestone payments are for the industrialisation of the RFT technology, paid on achievement of various performance triggers. SA is paying for the industrialisation scale-up, including all regulatory costs.
It's been a while now since we've had an update. I'm certain management haven't been sitting on their hands all this time. For this reason, if none other, the AGM promises to be very interesting. Good luck.
UNI Price at posting:
19.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
