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Biotech / Medical : LSK Lasik Vision Corp - Previously FVC (First Venture) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Maurice Siu who wrote (21)	7/12/1999 5:55:00 PM
From: seeker1	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 30

Maurice Interesting observation. Your comment encouraged me to dig a little deeper. Firstly I don't think the PE is relevant at this point. Neither company is showing any earnings. However the question is why is the market valuing TLC at almost $2.6B versus $170M for LSK. Is TLC worth 15X LSK? This premium multiple is certainly not reflected in the results. As much as I can determine, total # of procedures for the last 12 months (ending May 31)for TLC was 90,600 versus approximately 18,500 for LSK, a differential of about 4.8X. In the latest reporting period LSK reported 8906 operations vs. 29,200 for TLC. Again a differential of about 3.3X. More revealing may be the average # of procedures per refractive centre. In this comparison, LSK appears to be the leader. Remember that LSK is drawing its results from only 9 centres versus 48 for TLC. Therefore the average # of procedures for the latest quarters for each co. were 608 for TLC versus 2055 for LSK. The only answer I can come up with right now for the large discrepancy in the results/centre is the respective price point for each company's procedure. Based on the latest reporting period, it would appear that the average cost of each company's respective procedure is $686 for LSK and $1633 for TLC. Try and figure that one out! Obvious that LSK is being aggresive in each of its markets. The growth trends also appear to favour LSK. 388% increase in paid laser procedures for LSK vs. 110 % increase for TLC. Bottom line: No question that I think LSK may be undervalued versus TLC. But keep in mind that TLC has been around a hell of a lot longer and has established itself with Kaiser Permanente-big HMO in the US. I thought LSK's announcement a few weeks ago regarding the delivery of procedures for the 10,000 member US National Air Traffic Controllers Assoc. was a key strategic move. What thoughts do you have and have you identified additional competitors that we might be able to compare?