Versarien Share Discussion Threads

[tini5] 15/10/2018 13:07

CS, yes - in fact I believe NR may have intimated that an EU presence via Gnanomat post-Brexit would leave a potential avenue to EU funding.

I can't remember where/when he said it though, might have been a Tweet or comment at the AGM.

[club sandwich] 15/10/2018 12:56

Presumably after the UK Leaves VRS will no longer be eligible for that funding - but Gnanomat should be...?

[ellissj] 15/10/2018 12:52

Here's that FT batteries article shavers. EU shifting position rapidly since august. They know they are playing catch-up and need immediate injection of state aid to compete with us/asia. Else new entrants could capture ev market and potentially leave EU automotive industry in decline. My view here btw. I note Battery research funding ??? Step foward vrs/gnano here for potentially a chunk of next gen 2D battety tech grant money ? Hopefully. Aimo. Best ellis

"Batteries"

"EU to offer billions of funding for electric battery plants. Four groups planning to build European rival to Tesla’s ‘gigafactory’

October 14, 2018 11:00 pm by Rochelle Toplensky in Brussels

The EU is planning to allow state aid for electric battery research and will offer billions of euros of co-funding to companies willing to build giant battery factories. 

Brussels is concerned that the EU auto industry, which employs 13m people, could be left behind in the race to build mass market electric vehicles because of their reliance on batteries from Asia. 

Carlos Ghosn, chief executive of Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi said at the Paris Motor Show that the industry “cannot continue to prosper” unless it builds its own capacity.

“We know very clearly that the future is electric and we simply have to catch up with this (battery) technology,” said Maros Sefcovic, energy vice-president at the European Commission. “You cannot develop new models or high-quality cars if you do not master the skills, the innovation, and research link with batteries.”

Roughly 80 per cent of the world’s existing and planned battery production capacity is in Asia, according to Bloomberg data. China alone has 69 per cent, with the US at 15 per cent and the EU at under 4 per cent. 

A battery project launched by the EU a year ago now offers five types of funding.

Individual EU countries will be allowed to fund 100 per cent of research, as long as they involve some cross-border projects. The EU’s Horizon 2020 research fund has set aside €200m for battery projects; €800m is available to finance building demonstration facilities; regions looking to promote the industry can apply for the €22bn regional funds available; and the European Fund for Strategic Investment is available from the European Investment Bank to co-fund the billions of euros needed to build an EU equivalent of Tesla’s “gigafactory”. 

Mr Sefcovic said there are now 260 companies involved across the supply chain and four groups have aspirations to build a gigafactory. 

French-battery maker Saft has partnered with Siemens, Solvay and Manz to develop cheaper, more efficient solid-state batteries, which could begin production in seven years. Ghislain Lescuyer, the Saft chief executive, said the EU’s battery alliance “boosted the momentum” in the sector and “one year later it is well on track”.

Northvolt borrowed €52.5m from EIB to build a €100m demonstration line and research facility, expected to open in 2019 with ambitions to build Europe’s largest factory — 32 GwH in annual production — by 2023. 

Umicore, a materials and recycling group, is building a new plant in Poland to produce cathode materials — inputs for EV batteries, by 2020.

The German finance ministry is expected to announce a collaboration between the battery maker Varta and the US carmaker Ford to produce electric vehicle batteries, according to the German newspaper Tagesspiegel. 

The EU carmakers have refused to see the change occurring in electric vehicles for a long time and are only now starting to go in this direction. However, catch-up is still possible due to the EU industry's innovation capabilities and skills

Simone Tagliapietra

The Swiss company Leclanché makes lithium-ion batteries in Germany and chief executive Anil Srivastava suggested the EU should create an initiative to electrify buses. “It would stimulate demand for years to come and therefore industry will step up in Europe,” he said. 

“The EU carmakers have refused to see the change occurring in electric vehicles for a long time and are only now starting to go in this direction. However, catch-up is still possible due to the EU industry's innovation capabilities and skills,” said Simone Tagliapietra, a research fellow at the Bruegel thinktank.

Asian rivals are also building capacity in Europe. LG Chem of South Korea is building a large-scale lithium-ion battery plant in Poland, and Samsung SDI and SK Innovation are investing in Hungary.

To address the scarcity of raw materials, the EU plans to recover some from recycling old electronics and has also begun mapping European mineral deposits. The bloc has cobalt, lithium, graphite and nickel deposits in France, Finland, Portugal, Spain and the Czech republic, said Mr Sefcovic. 

Tesla, LG Chem, Leclanché and other battery-makers have also developed new processes that require two thirds less cobalt.

Mr Srivastava said if you combine recycling and the new lower cobalt methods “there will be enough cobalt around” in the near term..."

[festario] 15/10/2018 12:51

I don't know why they have dropped the advertised bid to 146p?I can sell shedloads at 150.5p

[bootie64] 15/10/2018 12:48

Clint, mine all cleared in Interactive Investor last week and after receiving an email from AJ Bell saying I have to complete a transfer form (which i have not done yet)to complete the transfer of the PB shares they have now shown in my account this morning.
Seems like they are trickling through, slowly...

[f3rdinand] 15/10/2018 12:36

I had to complete a share transfer form with Barclays before they would accept them from PB

[9degrees] 15/10/2018 12:33

Clint
I still dont have my placing shares into Barclays nominees either .
Have been in touch with both barclays and primary bid but it seems they struggle to talk to each other. Apparently some have gone through but not all?

[hoverflyman] 15/10/2018 12:28

David Kerr
“As did @neillricketts 😵 not the best of flights thanks to @British_Airways and also the rocket sat between us, who came close to getting his elbows rammed where the sun don’t shine #happydays”

... responding to Neill’s
“Just to let you know @DFK007 arrived safely.”

... then NR:
“Please remove any reference to rockets @DFK007 even if a typo for fear of the rocket police turning up and issuing you with a rocket violation notice. #banrocketsfromaim”

[squire007] 15/10/2018 12:03

Get buying plz .... I'm full and skint :-)

[clint fleecewood] 15/10/2018 12:02

For those tracking the supply of shares to market. I still don't have my placing shares in my AJ Bell account. Yawn! I like them but some of their systems are very creaky and slow.

[club sandwich] 15/10/2018 11:59

"I am expecting some news especially from AECOM who are CA based and for me the biggest potential user of Nanene"

the biggest potential user of Nanene *so far*... ;-)

[sandbag] 15/10/2018 11:58

anley,

Thanks for that. AECOM was in my mind when I wrote that post. Fingers crossed.

[stargazey] 15/10/2018 11:55

Impvesta 15 Oct '18 - 08:43 - 40638 of 40676

"RobinHood6915 Oct '18 - 08:28 - 40636 of 40637

Company in Derby looking at taking on 1,000+ composite employees over the next year."

What company is that please RobinHood?


Could it be Haydale Composite Solutions of Loughborough?

[anley] 15/10/2018 11:50

Sandbag.......I went to the Berlin exhibition in April and David was the only VRS representitive. Its not a problem as samples are not given away and its a big exchange of calling cards and a wonderful source of potential business which takes time to sort out.

Texas is where I wanted to go but I have only just returned to my office so was unable to go. NR is the star here and then will go up to CA with David and sort out a deal or two.

I am expecting some news especially from AECOM who are CA based and for me the biggest potential user of Nanene.

Hope this helps.

[squire007] 15/10/2018 11:42

Lol... few weeks I will be in Tasmania till end Feb .... me no stoopid ... lol :-)

[pshevlin] 15/10/2018 11:35

Not only the weather in blighty looks a bit bleak squire. I'm studying the situation from Bonn and I know where I'm going to be at the end of March 2019.

[sandbag] 15/10/2018 11:20

It seems to me from Neill's twitter that only he and David Kerr are on the US trip. Interesting that he's taking along the Head of Commerce and not any technical people. Interesting!
(Please excuse me if I've got that wrong as I've just scanned a few hundred posts).

[squire007] 15/10/2018 11:16

Take off in an hour... thats me not the share price ! But you never know :-) Blighty weather looks a bit bleak, but the Yorkshire ale awaits .... bliss !! Lol

[superg1] 15/10/2018 11:13

Kemor

I try not to give advice I just sound off if I spot thing that I think are potential BS.


I'll add in that the city helps along such BS especially if they have advised funds to back a company.

I read a bit about AGM and realised in quick time there was an appetite to have a number of employees on very good salaries on the back of fund raising from the city, a lifestyle share. BTW when they went to the US it was business class and plush hotels.

When they lied or should I say knowingly committed fraud in an RNS, then that was disgraceful and it caused some to invest and since lost money as result.

It remains a mystery as to why the FCA, Nomad, IP group and others who were fully aware have done nothing obvious about it.

My point early on re Hayd was that there was market confusion about whether they produced graphene and they made a clear claim that just about all graphene producers would have to work with companies like them re functionalisation
(that was their selling point).

Then I heard they were working on the basis that quality graphene cost pence per gram, so I wondered what they had agreed with Huntsman and the like. Unfortunately I believe Haydale fell for the hype out there and soon found over 95% of claims re graphene production are false.

I took the acquisitions to show revenue progress but I'm surprised as anyone else on how much cash burn they have.

Got to be those acquisitions. Ray and co didn't study the AIM if that's the case. Some can spin it for years on high M/Cs with virtually no revenue.

Once they have such visible revenue and material losses the market doesn't like it.

[pshevlin] 15/10/2018 11:07

In the FT an article re EU to offer billions of funding for battery plants to rival US. Hope we can get some of that.Unfortunately I don't have access to the article.

[kemorkid] 15/10/2018 10:59

Way back I asked superg1,about Haydale and took his advise of NOT investing in them

I am very grateful for his advice
Thsnk you

[superg1] 15/10/2018 10:34

Anley



Just for the record `I'm not picking on Haydale because they are involved in graphene. I just know the company due to researching the area and warned long back re some BS.

I was shocked re the cash burn rate in results. I hadn't been tracking that. I take it acquisitions were not thought through carefully re the cash burn.

Since that time various mutterings from folk in good positions suggests here is a fear that Hayd as it stands is in trouble, which may end up as terminal.

They will need cash at some point and after the £1.20 fund raise with big losses there will be little appetite to back them.

I'm not sure it's entirely Ray's fault, you know what the city is like.

With an M/C of around £7 mill now and a cash need of probably £5 mill or more needed just to keep the lights on going forward, then it shows how bad the dilution would be.

Time to bin whatever is causing them such a high cash burn, surely.

[club sandwich] 15/10/2018 10:28

If I were VRS I'd wait for Haydale to go bust then cherry-pick any assets or IP I wanted from the administrator...

[anley] 15/10/2018 10:26

SuperG..........an interesting comment on Haydale and its grant.

Bearing in mind that the cash burn is £450k per month (£5 million pa) then would you not have thought that the grantor would need to protect themselves from Haydale going into say administration.

In the world of PAT VAL and Luke Johnson how would anyone know in the case of Haydale if the grant money was in fact being spent?

[fuji99] 15/10/2018 10:06

Things could progress with positive comments/news once the US opens this pm.