Cyanconnode Share Discussion Threads

[realist1950] 02/7/2019 14:42

mtw - I thought you would realise that the shareholding structure here is so weak and dispersed that there are no 'larger shareholders' to speak of and none who would (or indeed COULD) oust the BOD imo. There are some institutions, true, but they are not buying in and holding shares in the kind quantities that warrant any true concern on their part...they are pretty distant to the stock and indeed, much like the fundies who have taken part in the many placings are just fulfilling the wish of their clients for a bit of risk in their portfolios. And of course this represents just a fraction of their wider portfolios. Pretty much all those millions of shares have either been sold at a loss, or have become worth very little by the yr on yr dilution that we've seen over the past 15 or so years (6 years for the current BOD). It is through this action that the company has managed to survive as long as it has, for they have never managed to sell their product in serious quantities, let alone turn in a profit. From this perspective at least, you could say (as I've previously posted) that the market itself has become CYAN's best customer as this has become the overwhelming source of funds. A google search for the company tends to confirm this; pretty much all of the results (over many pages) refer to THE MARKET......either to chat bulletin boards, financial websites, magazines and so on. There is very little in the way of actual primary 'business'. That's very alarming for a company that has actually been 'trading' (if one can call it that!), for over 15 years, albeit c.6 years under the current bosses. The only threat to the BOD really would be the future scenario of being unable to to raise future funds; there are no concentrations of shares with sufficiently interested parties for them to risk being sacked imho. If that happens I imagine it will be taken private....and the market would have funded the development of something over many years without ever having reaped any reward. When the company recently announced that it should be able to execute it's business plan on existing funds, I did not believe it for a moment. I fully, fully expect another funding round and it will be interesting to see the spin on this if/when it comes. I also expect another order update to either precede, flank or shadow the above when it comes. All in my opinion. ADYOR. All written without prejudice, as ever.

[yump] 02/7/2019 14:19

When I was on expenses commissioning stuff years ago, we used to get on a plane to some factories, knowing that there was little chance of running the trial plant and then go play golf for the week. That business was floated and had shareholders. Not saying that's what top management here are doing of course. Just a little amusing anecdote. Oh and when I used to work at a recruitment business in the 80's, we used to have a party every month in Europe somewhere nice, courtesy of the generous commissions we gave ourselves for recruiting puffy chested directors into PLC's. Of course the Personnel Directors of a few PLC's were invited along as well - be rude not to. The question is, has anything changed...?

[davep4] 02/7/2019 13:40

3 out of 5 ousted in the last 12 months.

[mtw] 02/7/2019 11:43

it beggars belief that the economies of truths have been happy clapped for so long by certain posters mainly at lse glee club. imho it is such posters partly responsible for the cosy position the BoDs retain. I have never understood why the larger shareholders have not ousted this shower long ago.

[realist1950] 02/7/2019 07:55

Someone selling well, well under the bid in order to get shot.

[realist1950] 02/7/2019 07:54

The buyers of 'yesterday' are the sellers of 'tomorrow'. Cue the scramble to get out. It has begun.

[lwaxf13] 26/6/2019 16:23

Is anyone here? On a serious note what do you think the big hitter management, sales and finance teams do all day? Seriously. It’s not like they are selling much stuff. It’s not like customers are banging down their doors. It’s not like they are successful. Roll on the next fund raise to keep this job creation scheme going a bit longer.

[davep4] 25/6/2019 22:48

Buywell3 Telefónica is contracted to provide G2/G3 network communications to the DCC for the Central and Southern Regions for a period of 15 years, (due to delays, I am uncertain as to when the contract period starts). It may well be the Communication Hubs can be upgraded to G4/5, however I suspect that it will be cheaper to maintain the G2/3 network rather than upgrading 24m meters. Also consider, that as the contract has suffered from several years of delay, that the G2/G3 network has to be maintained several years longer than Telefónica expected. The RNS you refer to is partly correct in that 10% of SMETS2 meters are expected to be fitted with the Dual Communications Hub. However the RNS is incorrect in saying that 10% of SMETS2 meters will be located in a ‘not spot’. If that were the case then around 50% of meters would need be fitted with the Dual Communications Hub at the predicted 1:4 ratio, (but that ratio would reduce if ‘not spots’ were as high as 10%). I hope this helps. Further....... (i) G2/3 ‘not spots’ are being confused with Zigbee communication issues, which is an entirely different problem. (ii) If the Dual Communication Hubs were upgraded to G4/5, that would not alter the Connode contract, nor the way in which the RF mesh operates.

[buywell3] 25/6/2019 07:44

I wonder what happens to the meters that have formed the low hanging fruit installation when 2G 3G are withdrawn ? Can't be very long now for 2G I would have thought , presumably they stop working What then ? Just seen this 23/02/18 In the UK and Europe you are likely to see MNOs shutting down 3G first and the frequencies being assigned to 4G to boost capacity. Every device on the market supports fallback to 2G for voice and data services, and 2G has the greatest coverage. Plus the 2G core network is much simpler to maintain than 3G which is a real headache for the mobile operators. Europe has has a lot of machine-to-machine (M2M) devices deployed in the field which use 2G for transferring tiny amounts of data on an infrequent basis. Due to cost, power limitations and sheer logistics these devices won't be upgraded to 4G for a long, long time, if ever. There isn't a business case to do so. buywell adds So 2G might be around for longer than some people think BUT ... telecomms equipment does not last forever , from my experience once over 10 years and it can start acting up. Maintenance and spares then become an increasing problem.

[buywell3] 25/6/2019 07:32

thanks davep4 Perhaps now you can post on the pros and cons of 'not spot' Does that get around the 2G 3G issues ? The way I read this is that 'not spots' mean increased revenue for CYAN from Toshiba Re 'The Toshiba contract was originally calculated to deliver £24m of revenue based on the assumption that 10% of SMETS2 meters would be located in ‘Not-SpotsR17;. However, Energy Suppliers are now finding that dwellings with thick walls, or in blocks of flats, or in areas with poor mobile signal, are contributing to one out of three meters being located in ‘Not-SpotsR17;. Consequently, if the percentage of meters located in ‘Not Spots’ is more than 10%, then CyanConnode’s revenue expectations from the contract will increase on a pro-rata basis. '

[multibagger] 22/6/2019 15:28

Welcome Ireland and Belgium :)

[multibagger] 22/6/2019 15:26

Excellent post and analysis davep4 ! You are right that Telefonica is not going to keep investing in legacy 2G/3G technology - thereby increasing our potential "not spot" business in terms of revenues.

[davep4] 22/6/2019 14:38

buywell2 – 630 buywell3 - 639 RNS Number : 6007B “The CyanConnode SMET2 contract relates to the Central and Southern regions, where approximately 24 million SMET2 smart meters will be connected to the DCC. The Company estimates that 2.4 million SMET2 smart meters will be fitted with RF mesh enabled communication hubs and that the momentum of such installations will increase during 2020.” CyanConnode’s RF mesh technology is embedded into Toshiba SMETS2 Dual Communications Hub, which are supplied under the Telefónica contract. Telefónica provides G2/G3 network communications to the DCC for the Central and Southern regions. The Home Area Network, (HAN), uses Zigbee, (not CyanConnode’s RF mesh technology), and communicates with the In Home Display and Gas Meter. Where the meter is a long way from the location of the In Home Display, or thick walls are in the way, it is estimated that the current Zigbee technology, (2.4GHz), doesn’t work for up to 30% of properties, (for the avoidance of doubt, this makes no difference to the CyanConnode contract). I have changed my view as expressed in post 581, because, (as you state in post 630), G2/G3 is more or less obsolete and it is my understanding that Telefónica has no desire to extend G2/G3 network coverage, which leads me to believe that, over the course of their contract, G2/G3 networks will deteriorate due to lack of maintenance and/or investment. Consequently: (i) Telefónica217;s G2/G3 coverage will not be as extensive as its G4/G5 coverage. (ii) Telefónica is not expanding G2/G3 coverage. (iii) Maintenance and replacement costs may reduce G2/G3 coverage during the lifetime of the Telefónica contract. (iv) It may become more cost effective for Telefónica to increase deployments of RF mesh technology, rather than maintaining a legacy G2/G3 network, in certain locations. The Toshiba SMETS2 Dual Communications Hub, (with CyanConnode’s RF mesh technology embedded), are deployed where a G2/G3 connection is unavailable. For every meter that cannot connect to G2/G3, a further 4 meters are required to form the local RF mesh, and any of those meters with a G2/G3 connection, can act as a gateway to the DCC, for the meter that doesn’t have the G2/G3 connection. Therefore, if 480,000 meters, (2% of the Telefónica contract), cannot connect to G2/G3 and are fitted with a Dual Communications Hub, then a further 1,920,000 meters will also need to be fitted with the Dual Communications Hub to form the local RF mesh. Although Connode pre-sold 500,000 licences, every time one of those licence’s is activated, an annual royalty of approximately 63p is charged by CyanConnode for the lifetime of the contract. Upon the 500,001 activation, a one-off licence fee is billed, (approx £3.6 per meter), plus the annual royalty, (approx 63p per meter). There is also other income from the Connode contract, for example firmware changes and upgrades, etc. I do not believe that CyanConnode will receive any meaningful income from its SMETS2 contract until mid-2020, this is because installers are targeting low hanging fruit first, (it is far easier and quicker to deploy meters that connect to G2/G3 rather than meters that require a local RF mesh network). I hope this helps.

[buywell3] 21/6/2019 07:15

thanks for that key question then how long has the company said it thinks it will be before all those licences will have to be used ?

[multibagger] 21/6/2019 07:06

Hi buywell3, No money made by Cyan at this stage as 500k "notspot" licences have been pre-sold. All those licences will have to be used up before we start making any money. Estimated that overall notspots in the UK will be about 10% (conservative estimates). When notspot smart meters are activated, our "one off" activation fees is £3.60 and recurrent annual fee is ) and about 62.4p recurrent.

[buywell3] 21/6/2019 06:20

How much money does that number of +105,334 smart meters make for the company ? Anyone know ?

[multibagger] 17/6/2019 16:06

UK Smets2 installed: +105,334 smart meters installed since 05 June 2019 17 Jun 2019: 1,213,789

[tightfist] 17/6/2019 13:59

Hi,I was told a long while ago that two chip fabricators were signed-of in both India and China (4 in total). I think I was told those in India were inside EPZ's, nor sure.Cheers, tightfist

[multibagger] 16/6/2019 04:54

Good morning tightfist and folks ! Up early before heading off to the World Cup and hope the weather holds up :) The Network Integration Cards (NIC) chip/cards (the chip that goes into the smart meter and provides the RF connectivity) are made by Smyrna in India at a unit about 3 hours from New Delhi. Brief video at the header - showing the DCC production. Smyrna, if I recall correctly is a Contract Equipment Manufacturer (CEM) with HQ in San Jose and manufacturing in Chennai and near Delhi. Production of NIC cards there has been ramped up as per RNS announcements. The failure rate/production defects in NIC cards which is quality controlled by Cyan is very low (though not six sigma) but impressive. There is enough capacity to ramp up to meet demand on Indian rollout - no concerns. It is the tuning of the NIC smart meter antenna that is a specialised area apparently. I don't understand that aspect of the Physics. Production initially was at Chennai but moved closer to Delhi for logistical reasons. BI factory (white label partner) is the back up for the NIC chips for RoW - if I understood the information correctly. I gather that Arqiva connectivity is not optimal, so we may be in play possibly - speculation on my part.

[tightfist] 15/6/2019 20:30

Hi MB,Thanks for your reply - if Cyan/Omnitech are perceived as an enabler for the politics of "Made in India" then it makes a lot of sense. If the licensed chips/boards are also MoI then so much the better. And if an offshoot of Cyan can eventually become Indian-owned then even better still..I entirely take your point about multiple disappointments in RoW excepting UK and Scandinavia. The UK SMETS2 cast iron recurring cashflow is becoming increasingly less discounted (ie more valuable), and we all patiently await the associated Not-Spots connection data..Thanks for the description of Hybrid meters, Indian style. It's interesting that hybridisation is taking place at DCC level rather than individual meter level as in the Toshiba SMETS2 meter. For competitive interest, how does the Arquiva meter achieve connectivity in the north of UK SMETS2?Cheers, tightfist

[multibagger] 15/6/2019 05:51

Good morning all ! Buywell2 to try and answer your query...however this was info from months ago and we have developed some new technology since*. India has piloted tried various mobile technologies including 3G, 4G, LTE and nothing works reliably for its sheer size as country, distances and population density. Roll out of 5G is in the testing phase currently in India. Again, 5G is reliant on mobile technology (which has failed in India for smart metering purposes) due to density, structure of buildings etc. Currently, there are two major technologies in play with regards to smart metering in India. RF mesh has also been installed in some projects by the likes of L&G, SSN etc, though we have the largest installed base. The other technology is based on Cellular/Mobile/GPRS and has made its way into some EESL installations. (EESL has failed miserably with regards to successful implementation of smart metering and effectively "not fit for purpose" - however, it has to be given a face saving way out/exit from a political and cultural context.) From what has been learned in smart metering from various pilots in India is That cellular/mobile based technology be used in areas where RF Mesh cannot be formed due to long distances between smart meters. (*However, this could also now shift given our long range solution (upto 12 Km) RF Mesh highlighted in the Distance Heating contract announced recently from the Nordics.) For more densely populated areas in India, use the RF Mesh + Cellular option = Hybrid solution The Hybrid solution is made up of 2 parts. The first part of the pathway is RF Mesh based from the smart meter to the Data Concentrator/Gateway. So this solves the last mile problem. The second part of the pathway from the DCC/Gateway to the Head End Software(HES)/Network Management Software(NMS) is through cellular/mobile and is GPRS based. So by using Hybrid technology, ie, using both Cellular and RF mesh in a project will reduce number of Simcard requirements for smart meters by about 200 times on average ( as about 200 smart meters at various building can connect to a single DCC/Gateway). A single Simcard at the DCC/Gateway then forwards all the data to the HES/NMS. 193 meter readings are taken every single day from every single smart meter in India. Cyan accuracy is over 99.8% in the collection and submission of this information and evidence has been submitted to the Ministry of Power (and also presented at the Investor Evening in London on 15 May 2019). Links at the top of the page. So if you think about the amount of granular data being generated every 15 minutes, data communication and transmission costs become a very important issue in the longer term and when deployed in scale. A huge and recurrent cost saving. Not at all surprising that Hybrid is gaining more acceptance against mobile technology only and current tenders seem to reflect this shift in direction of travel. Good luck !

[multibagger] 14/6/2019 08:36

With regards to India, I have asked this very question and had confirmation that roll out 4G or 5G technology will not have an impact on the Cyan business there. Both 4G and 5G are mobile based and given the size of India and potential cost of the infrastructure, this is not seen to be a threat to our business. In fact, the most recent RNS was about the pilot of about 3k "hybrid RF" mesh meters which is gaining traction as GPRS based (mobile based) systems are not working in India for various reasons. Also newer tenders which have come out have not specified that they are solely GPRS based (which is what EESL was about) and an abject failure. Links to Powerpoint presentations on the header indicate the scale of the EESL procurement and implementation failure - EESL was GPRS/mobile based. You could email Cyan directly - I am hopeful that they will respond to your technical query.

[buywell2] 14/6/2019 07:19

Thank you multibagger But the answer to my question is of paramount importance to me. Perhaps someone on this thread could email the company please Regarding India , which is indeed a huge opportunity for CYAN Since posting I have just read this: ' the AIRTEL CEO says that the demise of 3G technology is rapidly drawing near' AIRTEL was the biggest mobile operator in India, hence my question. In the link below AIRTEL also states they are going to aggressively redeploy 2G spectrum for 4G services hTtps://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/telecom/telecom-news/airtel-to-start-phasing-out-2g-3g-for-4g-says-gopal-vittal/articleshow/66381263.cms?from=mdr India is very rapidly going 4G htTps://www.opensignal.com/reports/2019/04/india/mobile-network-experience The merger of Vodafone and Idea Cellular is set to create India's biggest operator, with some 387 million subscribers across the country and plans to extend its 4G network to over 80% of Indian users. Hence I feel my question is a key one buywell dyor

[multibagger] 14/6/2019 07:11

Welcome to the BB Buywell2 ! I don't know enough on the technical question you have asked...but to me the UK SMETS2 contract is an "add on" revenue stream (though undoubtedly welcome). The Cyan story is largely a take on the Indian smart metering story in my view and will be the workhorse for revenues. Any other contracts coming off, is a real bonus. Share holders have been hugely disappointed before with virtual contracts and virtual revenues from round the world, so I am more cautious about this bit. If I were you, given what has gone before and where we are currently poised, I would think that this is a very good entry point. G Good luck if you choose to invest !

[buywell2] 14/6/2019 07:04

Some noteworthy posters on this thread; whilst I am interested in CYAN : Before considering whether to press the buy button I would like some of you more experienced erudite posters to tell me this; SMETS2 works on G2 and G3 ( it has been stated on this thread ) But my experience of Telecomms has given me a very accurate assessment that most becomes obsolete after around 10 years. For example within the CYAN context ,this has been born out by the emergence of G4 and now G5. So my question is how will SMETS2 operate in just a G4 and G5 environment ? I couldn't see an answer in this link hTtps://www.smartme.co.uk/technical.html many thanks in advance buywell