Zeev,
I thought I would address your earlier post to Lawrence in regard to dilution ...
<Lawrence: There is still one thing that I do not fully understand with the fertility of TTRIF shares. Before the $26 floorless leaking convertible (last August) there were some 30 MM shares (give or take), now we have 75 MM shares and "equity" of $50 MM. These additional 45 MM shares certainly could not have been all from the floorless convert. Where did all these additional shares come from?>
I'll take a stab. For starters, you were off by 20MM shares in the above comment (give or take). The 20-F, dated 4-30-97, ALREADY showed 49,834,681 shares I&O (up from 13,374,489 shares at 4-30-96...ouch!). This was, of course, long before the "floorless leaking" convertible debs came along.
Then, on 09-17-97, TT finalized the $26MM (Reg D) convertible debs with an initial draw down of $6MM. That gets us to roughly 56MM of the 70-75 MM share range Rene spoke of.
We also had 2,200,000 warrants expiring at 11-27-97 (Thanksgiving Day, how fitting), which were no doubt converted to common shares (i.e. exercise price of $0.55 US while the stock was over $2.00 a share at the time). That gets us to 58MM shares.
Other likely sources of new shares were, in order of desirability...
a) 1,133,158 in warrants exercisable at $0.38 US by 10-31-97, rising to $0.75 US thereafter, and expiring 10-31-98.
b) 2,107,950 in warrants exercisable at $0.50 US by 10-31-97, rising to $1.00 US thereafter, and expiring 10-31-98.
c) 6,980,147 in warrants exercisable at $0.75 US by 10-31-97, rising to $1.00 US thereafter, and expiring 10-31-98.
I'm guessing roughly half of the 10-31-97/98 warrants (Halloween, how chilling) listed above were converted into common stock (i.e. the stock was in the $1 7/8 to $2 1/8 range at the time), yielding another 5MM shares (the 4-30-98 20-F, due out in a couple of weeks, will be interesting reading). So, that gets us to 63MM shares of the 70-75 MM share range.
We have also been informed that an additional $4MM max will be drawn down on the remaining $20MM convertible deb facility. I'm hoping that Rene was including these 4MM shares (I know he is including at least 2MM) in his calculations bringing us to 65-67MM shares.
Therefore, there could be as few as 3MM shares and as many as 10MM shares which can't be reasonably accounted for from the 70-75MM share range currently I&O.
Do you agree? Once again, the upcoming 20-F will answer some of these questions.
In reply to SI #4186, where you wrote...
<David, I was a little taken aback by: "When you are to get a brand new patent on the technology (and plant), as TTRIF has done, it is no longer considered an improvement to the old technology. If it was just an improvement, the US PATENT Office would never have allowed a NEW patent...instead, the OLD patents (which are referenced in the license agreements) would have merely been EXTENDED. TTRIF will present a
letter from the US Patent Examiner and Attorney verifying this."
While I am not a patent lawyer, I have so far been granted 30 patents and have another 10 in the pipe line, so I know a little about the subject. There is no such a thing as an "Extension" to a patent, there are continuation in parts, divisions and other new patents.
You can get a "completely" new patent that will still be dependent on the prior technology, and no one can use the new patent without a license to the old. If the same inventors are on the patent, you can even get a new patent on a development that "would have been obvious to a person trained in the art", based on the first patent (but only the person inventing the first invention is entitled to this benefit). Frankly, until we actually see what is patented in the "new patent", we really do not know.>
Zeev, I will defer to you on the above and agree that we probably won't know what is actually patented for another five or six months (that time frame comes courtesy of Dan Cumming in a recent phone conversation). In your experience, is five or six months a realistic time frame- from the date of grant to date of issue (not sure that's the correct terminology)?
As for this statement.
< There is no such a thing as an "Extension" to a patent,.>
I will "patently" deny that.:-)Here's a link to USC Title 35- Patents, Section 156. Extension of patent term.
law.cornell.edu
I realize my contextual usage might not have been correct, but there most definitely IS such a thing as an "Extension" to a patent.
Regards,
David Pickering
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