ADVFN Logo ADVFN

We could not find any results for:
Make sure your spelling is correct or try broadening your search.

Trending Now

Toplists

It looks like you aren't logged in.
Click the button below to log in and view your recent history.

Hot Features

Registration Strip Icon for default Register for Free to get streaming real-time quotes, interactive charts, live options flow, and more.

BGT Bright Things

1.375
0.00 (0.00%)
08 May 2024 - Closed
Delayed by 15 minutes
Bright Things Investors - BGT

Bright Things Investors - BGT

Share Name Share Symbol Market Stock Type
Bright Things BGT London Ordinary Share
  Price Change Price Change % Share Price Last Trade
0.00 0.00% 1.375 01:00:00
Open Price Low Price High Price Close Price Previous Close
1.375 1.375
more quote information »

Top Investor Posts

Top Posts
Posted at 10/6/2010 17:03 by carl79
TA, That was not a quote, it was just a figure of speech and comes from me :-) ...simply to emphasise that I dont think if BGT was a US company they'd be doing much better than they are now...

Norbus, hey its all about risk, i may lose my entire portfolio tomorrow and im fine (ish - lol) with that. I like to buy when people are fearful (if I can see past their fears and think the market is calling it wrong). It tends to work as long as you keep your wits about you - you only need look at the past 12-18 months to see how irrational things got and how much contrarian investors will have made as a result. Im mean, come on, barclays at 50p! Wow...At the time you may have believed we were all about to be transported back to the dark ages but looking back, it kind of seems obvious there were bounces right across the FTSE just waiting to happen...PS I dont think it is plain sailing and fully expect a retrace / period of uncertainty for some time yet...im not about to advocate putting all your assets into stocks but i do see opportunities to trade

Back to BP, I simply think there has been a gross overreaction to the current situation; trading on the NYSE today indicates i may not have jumped to the wrong conclusion but if im wrong im wrong, i'll live to invest another day. Im greedy when others are fearful and vice versa - worked for Buffet, works for me... :-)
Posted at 03/6/2010 13:21 by carl79
TA, yes, it is yet another potential positive but I am not reading too much into it. I dont know the minutia of the discussion that have taken place and what, if any, concessions BGT have made to retain Veddis as investors.

Norbus, no disrespect implied by what you say so none taken. You have your opinion as do I. You were not so sure it was screaming out that Vikram simply wanted more (hence the depressed price - im assuming this is what you mean??) a wee while ago though and if anything you were quite irritated at the low price, regardless of how temporary or misleading! Ultimately, regardless of what is said, the share price was at the 1p level becasue the wider market did not have an appetite for the shares. This could be the result of a multitude of reasons and im not saying the share price deserved to be at 1p, but at the time, there was no one putting their hand in their pocket, not even you or I (who are bulls). Unless you are in some way intimating that Vikrant has ordered a veto on any positive information coming from the company in order to suppress market interest, I honestly do not understand how you think this one man influenced the likes of you and I to not buy more shares at 1.05 (which I actually considered yesterday before the move north). I got a quote for 150k three times and nearly pressed buy but have promised myself i'll only top up sub 1p as i actually think i have enough BGT...Its semantics anyway. If we hit 4p with no more than a peep from the company, i'll be shocked but i wont be complaining! If we dont though and this stagnates or even drifts in the lull between news, I may remind you of this conversation if you start to get agitated at the lack of company news and apparent disinterest in driving the share price ..
Posted at 20/5/2010 09:40 by carl79
In most cases when someone says they dont see much downside they mean that they perceive the odds of the downside coming to fruition as remote - or at least they believe that on balance there is a better chance of an upside.

This is why I think the downside is limited. So, whilst i dont dispute going bust is a possibility, of course it is, i think the odds of them going bust are quite remote given where we are...

There is a proven market. Although I always thought this, and argued against the likes of LDM who told us the market was saturated over a year ago, it is reassuring to see them grow the base week on week.

They are making revenue. It has been a significant period since BGT made regular cash and this is also a solid sign that things are on the up.

They have alignment with influential and successful investors - no point me harping on about Vik's credentials

They are recruiting. Janet and John really, you simply dont inflate SG&A unless it pays off very quickly, certainly not in times like this when cash is king. So, my thoughts are that the existing base is in need of fresh developments and support, they want to grow as quick as possible by hiring new development and support resource or probably a mixture of both. In any event, recruiting is a clear positive.
Posted at 12/5/2010 21:19 by carl79
In the world of AIM it is often not being able to raise more funds that kills off companies. I think we are past most of the uncertainty now. There is clearly a market. We have got a strong technical team. We are getting some good exposure and we have a sound model (I think it is safe to assume we are still firmly after the premium sites)...So it is not such a gamble for investors (and hopefully banks) to pump money into the operation...All we need is confirmation of how loud the tills are ringing...As above, the fact that they are growing the team suggests to me that things are going well and that money is not a limiting factor...you dont recruit when you are down to your last penny and you certainly dont recruit if your workload can be dealt with by existing employees...Im very positive about this recent spate of recruiting...
Posted at 06/5/2010 10:11 by carl79
Good to see us improving our key word ranks...hopefully it translates to tangible benefits...the intangible stuff is starting to irritate me...:-)

This is interesting:



Can Self-Funded Win Out Against Investor-Funded?

KNOXVILLE, Tenn., May 4, 2010 - The social platform industry was shaken up recently with Ning's announcement that it would be forcing its free sites to upgrade or leave. Almost immediately after the announcement former free Ning users who no longer had a home for their community started looking for alternatives. Comments left on news articles about Ning's announcement revealed an underlying fear many of them had about switching to another free service: if the industry leader wasn't able to make it, how could any of the alternatives?

While other companies have shied away from answering this question, Spruz - a free social website platform much like Ning - has provided a direct response to it. "The bottom-line difference between Spruz and Ning is that we are a self-funded company that is already profitable," stated Jay Roberts, founder of Spruz, who went on to say, "While Ning had $120 million in investment from outside sources, Spruz has always operated as a boot-strapped company. This has resulted in our business model being completely sustainable from the ground up, with free sites being an integral part of it."

Other mentioned alternatives to Ning include Grou.ps and SocialGo, both with substantial funding. Startups who accept funds from outside sources have the difficult task of turning a profit much larger than necessary to maintain the service they provide, as most investors are interested in the acquisition value of a company. Jay Roberts added that, "Spruz has already experienced tremendous growth since Ning's announcement, requiring us to increase our staff and deploy additional hardware. The fact that we are profitable and have no venture funding means we are able to grow to meet the demands of our users without fear of imploding. We're looking forward to welcoming anyone looking for a stable platform to move their community to."

So, self-funded or investor-funded? The fate of Ning may serve as a very telling answer.

Jay Roberts explains how Spruz Freemium is sustainable in

Spruz launched in 2007 as a hosted social website solution that makes it easy to create your own public or private community website about anything.
Posted at 04/5/2010 14:57 by the analyst
"Did This Startup Founder Con Her Way Into a $750 Million Valuation?"



"We hear Bianchini fiddled with Ning's financial and traffic numbers in selling the company to its last round of investors. And not just the forecasts, which are routinely pumped up by Silicon Valley entrepreneurs to wishful-thinking venture capitalists, but actuals. It was the discovery this fakery that purportedly led to her March ouster."
Posted at 16/4/2010 19:23 by the analyst
It could be time for BGT to raise funds and then let the world know that they are cash rich, are on their way to break-even, are a safe platform for anyone wanting a pro social network etc.

Ideally, they would get the money from high-profile investors (like Vikrant) then these investors could also pump out their own PR saying how SocialGO is the 'only' serious (and safe) platform.

I could even imagine them putting out sound-bites about how ning must be in big financial trouble to be making this sudden move. If premium ning users think that ning may be going bust they will want to move to socialgo before wasting any more time and effort developing their ning sites
Posted at 09/9/2009 00:51 by the analyst
So as promised, I've now been through the rns statements again and this is what I have - this is really just reinforcing my research for my own benefit, but am posting it for the interest of others. I may have missed things and got things wrong, so do your own research before accepting this as fact:



Historical business, April 2004 - Nov 2007
Prior to Nov 2007 BGT had a business based on asic/bubble/iDVD - the business survived from April 2004 until Nov 2007. During that time, Dom spent £80k on shares at 9p. That business basically went bust. Dom did badly on that share purchase and if he sold them today he would be down over 85%



So, on to the important bit, the CURRENT business - SocialGO.com:

Nov 2007 - £955,000 raised at 4p per share in order to develop the product
The new business began in November 2007 with the acquisition of Commonworld with the aim of developing a 'social network' venture. Dom bought 2.5m shares at 4p per shares. What many people won't realise is that this was dilutive for Dom, as his shareholding went from 18.7% down to 13.6%, despite investing £100k. This indicates that he saw this new venture as very speculative and did not have a great deal of confidence at that time. The 4p price was at a huge discount to the previous price range of around 6-8p - not unexpected for a company going to the sword.
[nb at the time, I thought this new venture was doomed, given ning's domination, funding and that BGT said they were going to develop it as a boxed product, so did not consider investing)



Sept 2008 - £734,500 raised at 1.25p to take it to a fully working product
During this placing Dom took 16m shares at 1.25p for a total sum of £200k. Although this meant his previous purchases at 9p and 4p were diluted, his overall holding went up to 19.6%. At this stage, the purchase showed confidence in the product as it was a much bigger sum being invested and his percentage was raised
[note - investors had the opportunity to buy at well below 1p per share on the open market following this placing, so there was no need to be diluted, if they chose to buy in - I bought shares at below 1p]



April 2009 - £750,000 raised at 1.25p to continue product development, expand infrastructure
During this placing, Dom took 12.8m shares at 1.25p for £160k, which kept his shareholding at a similar level to before (18.9%). Again, the fact he bought so many shares shows confidence, but shareholders were diluted and did not get the opportunity to buy shares at the same price, but could have bought at 1.4p on occasions
[it may be worth detractors noting that this was historically one of the toughest times we have ever seen for a listed microcap technology company to attract funding. Many start-ups with insufficient funding were going bust, but BGT did not]



Sept 2009 - £940,000 raised at 1.25p to market the SocialGO product
During this placing Dom took 32m shares at 1.25p for a total sum of £400k. This raised his stake to 25.5%, which, given his warrants, is realistically the most he could possibly take without being in a position where he would have to offer to buy the company (should he take his options up). Again, there has not been an opportunity for investors to buy at the placing price (yet), so this is dilutive. You can currently buy at 1.39p



Summary
In total £3.4m have been raised by the company for developing the SocialGO product. The company probably has around £900k cash in the bank. In terms of spending on a new social network creator this is peanuts, so if they manage to get into profitability with say, one more round of funding that would be quite an achievement imo (having had a lot of luck along the way with ning messing up and with attracting WL to the mix)

Dominic has purchased a total of 63.3m shares at an average price of 1.36p per share

Currently you can buy shares at 1.39p

So, any investor wishing to purchase more shares, can do so at just about the same average price that Dom has bought into the socialGO product - therefore no need to be diluted in comparison to Dom

Overall, after looking back at these placings again, I still don't know what all the fuss has been about. I do agree that the previous business was badly run and a big failure. For that reason alone, it stands to reason that people should have a healthy scepticism of the management's ability to make SocialGO a success. However, I don't see any real evidence that the Board have taken investors for a ride during the SocialGO era (as has been suggested might be the case, by some)

It's not as if we have seen them restructure share capital to issue shares at a discount to the nominal value, which would be bad (but has been very very common during the recession). All we have seen is investment from management in the company at prices similar to those that we could also buy at.


A good investment?
It's still an incredibly risky investment, albeit with outstanding potential returns should SocialGO become a player in the social networking sector.

The management have a proven track record of success (with Eidos) and of Failure (with asic/bubble/iDVDs). So, time will tell...
Posted at 02/9/2009 23:25 by the analyst
"I spent five years living in Silicon Valley building my video games company in the Nineties. I intend to spend more time there promoting SocialGO in the coming months. We have a small office ready to form a bridgehead to the American market which is not only our largest market (already in traffic terms) but also the most mature in the adoption of the idea of micro networking. We need to be among our Web 2.0 (or indeed 3.0) peers and we need access to those people who can help market the product as well as those companies that can help partner with us to spread its reach."


So, it really does look more and more as if Dominic has simply gorged himself on cheap shares prior to starting on the PR and marketing campaign. You could read both good and bad into that. Obviously, for investors that bought into the SocialGO story at 4p, they would rather have seen the success story sold (and a share price rise) prior to a fundraising at a much higher price.

For investors looking to buy in now, though, the situation is different - they can buy in now at a low price, with a reduced risk and a business model that is progressing well. They can also see that the CEO has enough confidence in the company to be buying a huge number of shares. All good signs for new investors or anyone that has bought around the 1-2p level, imo.

So, when will they reveal how many premium networks they have? When will they reveal what the average price being paid by those networks? It seems to me that they are not at all keen to reveal the numbers right now. Why? Is it to keep the competition from seeing them? Or, is it simply so they could issue themselves cheap shares and get away with it more easily? Or both? Who knows, but at some stage they will have to let investors know the KPIs...
Posted at 28/7/2009 16:29 by the analyst
So as promised, I've now been through the rns statements again to look at the money that has been raised in order to develop SocialGO

I may have missed things and got things wrong, so do your own research before accepting any of this as fact:



Historical business, April 2004 - Nov 2007
Prior to Nov 2007 BGT had a business based on asic/bubble/iDVD - the business survived from April 2004 until Nov 2007. During that time, Dom spent £80k on shares at 9p. That business basically went bust. Dom did badly on that share purchase and if he sold them today he would be down over 85%



So, on to the important bit, the money raised to develop the CURRENT business - SocialGO.com:

Nov 2007 - £955,000 raised at 4p per share in order to develop the product
The new business began in November 2007 with the acquisition of Commonworld with the aim of developing a 'social network' venture. Dom bought 2.5m shares at 4p per shares. What many people won't realise is that this was dilutive for Dom, as his shareholding went from 18.7% down to 13.6%, despite investing £100k. This indicates that he saw this new venture as very speculative and did not have a great deal of confidence at that time. The 4p price was at a huge discount to the previous price range of around 6-8p - not unexpected for a company going to the sword.
[nb at the time, I thought this new venture was doomed, given ning's domination, funding and that BGT said they were going to develop it as a boxed product, so did not consider investing)



Sept 2008 - £734,500 raised at 1.25p to take it to a fully working product
During this placing Dom took 16m shares at 1.25p for a total sum of £200k. Although this meant his previous purchases at 9p and 4p were diluted, his overall holding went up to 19.6%. At this stage, the purchase showed confidence in the product as it was a much bigger sum being invested and his percentage was raised
[note - investors had the opportunity to buy at well below 1p per share on the open market following this placing, so there was no need to be diluted, if they chose to buy in - I bought shares at below 1p]



April 2009 - £750,000 raised at 1.25p to continue product development, expand infrastructure
During this placing, Dom took 12.8m shares at 1.25p for £160k, which kept his shareholding at a similar level to before (18.9%). Again, the fact he bought so many shares shows confidence, but shareholders were diluted and did not get the opportunity to buy shares at the same price, but could have bought at 1.4p on occasions
[it may be worth detractors noting that this was historically one of the toughest times we have ever seen for a listed microcap technology company to attract funding. Many start-ups with insufficient funding were going bust, but BGT did not]



Sept 2009 - £940,000 raised at 1.25p to market the SocialGO product
During this placing Dom took 32m shares at 1.25p for a total sum of £400k. This raised his stake to 25.5%, which, given his warrants, is realistically the most he could possibly take without being in a position where he would have to offer to buy the company (should he take his options up). Again, there has not been an opportunity for investors to buy at the placing price (yet), so this is dilutive. You can currently buy at 1.39p



Summary
In total £3.4m have been raised by the company for developing the SocialGO product

Dominic has purchased a total of 63.3m shares at an average price of 1.36p per share

Currently you can buy shares at 1.39p

So, any investor wishing to purchase more shares, can do so at just about the same average price that Dom has bought into the socialGO product - therefore there is no need for any investor (that has funds) to be diluted in comparison to Dom

Overall, after looking back at these placings again, I still don't know what all the fuss has been about. I do agree that the previous business was badly run and a big failure. For that reason alone, it stands to reason that people should have a healthy scepticism of the management's ability to make SocialGO a success. However, I don't see any real evidence that the Board have taken investors for a ride during the SocialGO era (as has been suggested might be the case, by some). It's not as if we have seen them restructure share capital to issue shares at a discount to the nominal value, which would be bad (but has been very very common during the recession). All we have seen is investment from management in the company at prices similar to those that we could also buy at.


A good investment?
It's obviously a risky investment at this stage, albeit with outstanding potential returns should SocialGO become a major player in the social networking sector.

The management have a proven track record of success (with Eidos) and of Failure (with asic/bubble/iDVDs)

Only time will tell...

Your Recent History

Delayed Upgrade Clock