Virax must surely be fast approaching the day when it folds the...

Virax must surely be fast approaching the day when it folds the tent. With the company's cash reserves almost depleted, and the probability of raising more cash in the current market environment being at best two-fifths of f... all, the company's days are greatly numbered.

The clowns who ran this company for so were so incredibly hopeless that by the time a decent Board was appointed, the comnpany's fate was long sealed. In fact, so extreme was their ineptitude that it was almost comical - unless one happened to be a shareholder.

The main characters in this comedy gone horribly wrong are as follows:
- David (long term milestones) Beames
- Tom (she'll be right) Quirk
- Richard (I'm not incompetent) De Lautour
- John (line my pockets) Chambers
- John (along for the ride) Stonier

Rarely, if ever, has there been a management team that combined such gross incompetence, contempt for shareholders, lack of accountability, all the while blatantly running the company for the benefit of management rather than shareholders.

In their final years prior to being dismissed en masse by major shareholders, it was as if they were saying to shareholders:

"We may be totally incompetent, we may have decimated shareholder value, but if you (shareholders) are stupid enough to allow us to remain in office, we will gladly keep using your funds to pay ourselves our substantial salaries".

However, even among this group of ninnies, special mention must go to David Beames, who served as CEO from 1996 to 2007. In 2005, following the (second) near collapse of Virax, he all but blamed shareholders for the company's abject performance for only having provided "limited capital".

He appears too obtuse to have realised that raising capital is the primary objective of the CEO of a company such as Virax, a failure or inability to raise capital being the ultimate proof that he is not performing.

Then there is the small matter that he a) declined to raise meaningful capital at several opportune instances; and b) deliberately declined to create the circumstances (positive newsflow) that would have enticed market participants to stump up cash.

And finally, even when the company had formally suspended two of its three products, while being around $20m short to continue with the third, he had the gall to justify his performance and salary on the basis that management performance, and a company's future likelihood of success, can't be judged on short term share price. To my mind, I can't think of anything more predictive of long term success than an inability to fund one's product development. Further, one doesn't need to be a Wall Street banker to realise that massive dilution caused by capital raisings at dismally low share prices does little to enhance shareholder value.

Take a bow David - you are truly one of a kind; incompetent, arrogant, with the hide of a Brontosaurus.

Let us hope that we have seen the last of this ghastly cast of characters. In the unlikely event that any of these incompetent, self serving fools is appointed to the Board of another ASX listed company, SELL, SELL, SELL.