Versarien Share Discussion Threads

[club sandwich] 08/11/2018 16:01

"Nanene is just made from crushed pencils mixed with toothpaste and lemon juice"

you forgot the marmite...

[1teepee] 08/11/2018 16:01

Lots of similarities between you and the Chinese government.

[magic beans] 08/11/2018 15:59

For new posters to this board, there are some people who post on here trying to convince you that Nanene is just made from crushed pencils mixed with toothpaste and lemon juice, whereas other graphene companies have high-end products that are selling at tuppence per tonne.

The truth is that yes, there are other graphene producers out there, and maybe, just maybe they will corner the golf ball market, sound insulation foam and the giant buckety thingy market. That’s fine. I’m sure we'll be more than happy if Versarien just corner the Aerospace, Consumer goods, packaging, apparel, medical/bio sensor, rubber composites, plastics, consumer electronics, flexible electronics, wearable devices, sporting goods (excluding golf balls), construction materials, petrochemicals, phone accessory, lcd display, conductive inks, graphene film and battery markets and all those markets that I've missed (I'm posting from the pub) and the ones that have yet to be uncovered.

No need to be greedy, and we can always go back for the golf balls, buckety things and anything else that slips through the small fish net later if we feel like it.

[ad63] 08/11/2018 15:59

From our China Update RNS 05/11/2018: 'As previously reported, the Company has also established a wholly owned Hong Kong company which will be used as the platform for joint ventures in other Asian countries.' - just love the 'which will be used'....tick tock :)

[luckyorange] 08/11/2018 15:55

Ahhhh Shaddap You Face

[luckyorange] 08/11/2018 15:45

To be absolutely honest I am aware of other graphene companies but all of the research was undertaken by long termers on here very early on which identified shortcomings and possibilities so it has all become old hat and yawn worthy.

Competition in the UK and Europe was my main interest and was thoroughly disappointed when Thomas Swan didn't get a look in with the CPI bids, however I was very pleased that VRS had a clean sweep with everything they tendered for.

Ray was a real tryer at Haydale and the one down in South Wales is long forgotten, are there any more in the UK? Morgan Advanced Materials seems to have opted out and it seems that it is all down to WMG, GEIC, UOM, UOC, CPI, NGI etc, all establishments with a good reputation, so much so that the NGA wanted in on GEIC.

UK is quite a hub for graphene now with the US , China and many other countries involved in the establishments here, wonder why that is?

Anyway , I suppose the point is that VRS are here and pushing forward and have built a solid reputation. That has brought me to the point that I now have little interest in 'other' 'graphene' companies and will stick with VRS as it develops.

It is worth noting that some PI's have fallen by the wayside happy with their lot, but a lot of the early PI investors are still here because they have a bit of insight into the future.

[loglorry1] 08/11/2018 15:44

NanoExplore Canadian listed Graphene producer (£84M market cap ~£100m less than VRS)

It’s worth taking a look at NanoExplore a Canadian listed Graphene producer and comparing it with VRS. I’m not advocating buying NanoExplore shares but as you can see below it shows a) how far behind VRS are compared to them and how much higher VRS are valued than NanoExplore (nearly 3 times as much as VRS is £200m+, even more fully diluted).

DESCRIPTION
“Our process is high yield, large volume, low cost, and produces graphene powder with very high quality. This allows us to target mass industrial material markets such as polymers, markets requiring large volumes of material. And due to the quality of our graphene, we can provide significant benefit to industrial materials at low loadings and viable price points.”

Main comparison product to Nanene is Graphene Black 0X tech sheet below

As you can see lateral size is good average 13um and good distribution see figure 2. 6-10 layers. See Fig 1, 2 below.

SALES GROWTH
Sales growing strongly (quarterly reports below)
2018-03-31: CAD$ 2.81m
2017-21-31: CAD$ 1.39m
2017-09-30: CAD$ 0.613m
2017-60-30: CAD$ 0.760m

New Canadian production of 10,000 tonnes per year selling at $10/KG!


FUNDING
Just raised CAD$10m at CAD$1.65 valuing company at CAD$155m current market cap $CAD145m to fund the 10,000 tonnes a year expansion

UNIVERSITY CONNECTIONS
Strong University links with University of Toronto . Professor Park.
NanoXplore has a team of 5 Mitacs Canada Accelerate postdocs who work to develop innovative low-cost graphene nanocomposites for industrial use?

CUSTOMERS
Obviously given it is building a new 1000 tonnes per year facility it has no shortage of customers. Here is a description of one of their latest projects.

“it launched a new blow and injection molded plastic facility earlier this year to manufacture engineered plastics products, and is already supplying to more than 30 customer”

WHERE DO THEY THINK THE MARKET IS HEADING?
“The graphene market has changed significantly over the last three years. Three years ago the challenge for end users was to obtain decent material, in volume, at a reasonable price. Today there are several producers, including NanoXplore, producing large volumes of good quality graphene. Prices per kg for high quality graphene have fallen during this period from $30,000 kg to $100 Kg and are set to fall to $30 kg over the next five years.”




FIG 1


FIG 2

[festario] 08/11/2018 15:44

Wouldn't the chart have looked so much better with a blue finish of any kind today. Sigh...

[bootie64] 08/11/2018 15:36

Technology Disruption

An interesting article on US Plug-In Electric Car Sales - growth of 138% year-over-year


And its good news for Tesla too

The Tesla Model 3 currently represents almost 36% of the total U.S. plug-in car market and together with Model S/X, Tesla takes almost a perfect 50%


Scroll to the bottom of the page to see the S curve on the charts - Tony Seba will be happy :)

[jbe81] 08/11/2018 15:08

Neill should be about ready to fire the gun on the ship!

[jointer13] 08/11/2018 15:08

this is a good post...written by a man who knows what he is talking about..serratia


reflections on Graphene quality -



I've read numerous papers on the topic and a number of factors effect quality. Layer number, lateral length, functional groups and structural damage being the main participants.

No papers have been found where one of the above can be studied in isolation. For example a thesis may comment on the effect of layer number but the different materials tested vary with all the other factors. In composites if one test was using a Graphene with few layers but had very short laterals it would perform poorly due to short laterals so nothing could be concluded re layer number. It isn't possible to obtain material which is identical in all variables except say layer number to allow layer number to be examined in isolation.

What we are seeing is for composites very short laterals don't perform. Very long laterals tend to fold during dispersion and unfold when stressed thus reducing the strength. Multi layered material performs poorly as the layers slide over each other under stress. Functional groups added during manufacture should improve dispersion and this happens in most Graphene production processes. The effect of different functional groups on performance hasn't been systematically studied yet but depending on the chemistry of the polymer educated guesses can be made. If you could make Graphene with no functional groups at all would you be able to disperse it in the matrix I would think it would be difficult.

With all the variables there is no single magic cut off number. The implications are that say 5 layer material would give greater benefits than 10 layer and 10 layer better than 15 layer. It looks as though much more than 15 layer reduces performance. Theoretical calculations can be made on the effect of lateral size and these tie in with the poor performance of very short laterals. It's not so easy to predict optimum lateral length as folding during dispersion can override the calculation for an isolated length strength.

What all this implies is that different Graphene's will give different performances. It won't be an all or nothing ie this works this won't within the limits mentioned above. We can say too short or too long laterals will perform badly and 20 layer material will perform badly. Within those limits we should see improvements in performance as we move towards optimum layer number and length.

This all holds for composite strength. If the end use requires other properties such as heat or electrical conductance and strength is not the most important factor then layers/laterals aren't so demanding.



What we are seeing is some customers getting excited by the improvements seen using what might be considered sub optimal Graphene. For example Ford are quite rightly impressed by a 20% strength increase using XG material and are working with it but I would be surprised if more optimal Graphene based on the factors mentioned didn't show a 50% or even 75% improvement. The same goes for tyre strength. Some Chinese tyre producers are showing benefits but they could probably do better.

The 6th element Chinese company have a deal with Huawei in mobile phones for “graphene film cooling technology”. The product profile for heat removal is not as demanding as composite strength Graphene so a material that might be sub optimal for strength could be used in that application. 6th element don't state layer numbers in their data sheets so I can only assume it's multi layer. What if they made the phone casing using a more optimal composite ? They'd get both heat dissipation and strength.

Another 'producer' I looked at said their product contains FLG but when you look at the analysis it's 50% graphite with the rest FLG it's the way you tell them !

My conclusion so far is that yes you will see benefits from sub optimum Graphene's and these will be sufficient to excite the customer but when more optimal Graphene's are tested they will realise that there is a lot more benefit to be achieved.

[superg1] 08/11/2018 14:57

I’m busy so can only pop on occasionally, will remove bans later (about 5 now).

#Simplerules.

[tini5] 08/11/2018 14:57

lovat, indeed.

Neill and team meanwhile just getting on with it.

[loglorry1] 08/11/2018 14:56

@billwave if you want to believe any of this then knoxck yourself out. It's not true but it makes no difference to the investment case in VRS.

Can you point me to any evidence of your successful investment track record? I've called out (with help from others) a lot of stock promotions on Aim successfullym

[loglorry1] 08/11/2018 14:52

Very good @66 made me chuckle.

-------
Just found out there is a new company on the block. Logsarian, they produce Kempnene, initial trials have shown it to be "thick, transparent, lowers the properties of anything it enters and is rather smelly" Scientists say they have seen early signs it may help cattle with constipation.

At first i thought it was going to be competion....phew

[sandbag] 08/11/2018 14:52

WRT AIM:

Some of us are older than others and some of us have quite substantial holdings so the Inheritance Tax exemption for qualifying AIM companies is quite important. This would be lost on the main market.

BTW:
Managed to pick up another 2000 shares today. Every little helps.

[lovat scout] 08/11/2018 14:50

Tini - what I find most surprising is that the critics expect VRS to publicly disclose strategic and commercially sensitive information. Two of VRS’s neighbours, Renishaw and Dyson, are fiercely protective in this respect and that doesn’t seem to have done them any harm.

As for relative valuations of high risk high reward companies operating in a rapidly expanding sector - what a waste of time. You make your choices and see what happens - that’s what stock markets are for. It is impossible to make definitive judgments in such a fast moving area of the economy.

The stock market tends to value companies with a balance sheet that gives them a good chance of maturing a valuation many times those that are about to call the ambulance.

AIMHO etc.

[loglorry1] 08/11/2018 14:36

@jointer13 not a bad try. Only problem is that this was over a year ago for 1.2kg of Graphene! The companies I'm talking about are producing hundreds of tonnes. It's not hard to see why the companies I'm talking about weren't tendering for a contract to supply a little more than a bag of sugar worth!

"a lot of claims spouted about graphene/graphite, most of them probably b/s."

A lot yes but not all. FGR are chosen suppliers to Manchester Uni for 2 years. They have a product in use by Rio Tinto. XGS supply Ford motors. All have strong University links who have verified their products.

[festario] 08/11/2018 14:34

AIM is bent, but they all are to different degrees.ASOS, Wynnstay Group and others have done quite well on AIM though?Fevertree has an insane market cap based on its forward forecasts, but it's holders got swept away by the potential of its brand expansion plans in the US. It's also had a 30% correction recently, not dissimilar to us.

[laginaneil] 08/11/2018 14:30

AIM market ok with me. Let Neill decide when / if to move!