Here are some reasons why I remain positive
-I was told of a statement by the resigning CEO about a month ago when he explained his reasons for selling a portion of his stock that he "has no doubt that Valence will have the best battery in the world".
-I was told that one or more Valence Engineers believed the product coming off the production lines in October or November was good enough for most OEM's at that time. Test results were improving at a rate much higher than expected, largely due to Dr. Kalnoki Kis who came over from Gould to join a winning team. The rate of progress was so great that the CEO reportedly favored continuing with R&D and not rushing with production in order to bring a much superior product to market.
-Also around October, on his return from the NI plant, Cal stated how pleased he was to observe that line 2 was running completely automated from start to finish. I believe it was at 50% speed at the time.
-Last July I was made aware of some test results showing that of 3 vendors submitting samples to a large Cellphone mfr, Valence's product was clearly superior.
-I was told of a conversation with a company official early this week who was quoted as saying that in spite of some minor problems, they should be able start regular production before the end of the quarter. Again the company seemed to show little concern about financing- when needed it would almost certainly be capital, not equity financing.
-A veteran whose opinion I respect believes that if for some reason the company had trouble raising capital, a fair buyout price would be $8-10 and considers this the downside over the next several months. He stated that Carl Berg would not favor a buyout, that it was highly unlikely, and that we should have more than one encouraging development over the next few weeks. He also believes the seller should be finished in a day or two.
-There is a consensus that moving the conf call to the 17th should allow for commissioning of the lamination equipment, and increases the likelyhood that we will hear that at last, the equipment is ready to be ramped up and a contract is in the works.
In summary, the process of making many test runs and adjustments to the machinery, the chemical formulas etc can seem to take forever to an observer who is not directly involved. We know line 1 was particularly problematic, but that's old news because it started a year ago. The company has stated that line 1 has been running well for some time now.
I have been involved in the startup of process machinery for almost 30 years and have often listened to the opinions of bystanders who had doubts that a particular system of machinery would ever operate as intended. Some took longer than others, but on every occasion, it was operational when I finished my portion of the work. |
