So we went from a company selling a long term dream backed up by a current ongoing enterprise... to one with a current ongoing and growing enterprise backed up by a much smarter and achievable way to get some of their dreams to market; out-licensing. I've said before that, while it hurt to lose the dream, this was a very smart and tough decision, and I'm glad man'gment could pull the trigger. This company just proved it's not run by a Mitch Gold kind of ego, but by businessmen who, instead of falling in love with an image of what might be, looked at the image and redrew it into a much better fit for current and rapidly evolving realities. At least that's my take. The best thing is that, with PCT, they're sitting at the gate of the mine, as much of medical care over the next decade realigns itself to a cell based, and in many cases, 100% individualized medicine. This can only create many unforeseen opportunities for CLBS.
All just my dos centavos. Along those lines, there's a saying in Spanish which perfectly described Neostem and nearly all other small biotechs; "mucho abarca, poco aprieta". It means that if you try to grab a lot, you won't have any of it held tightly... which is the story of these small bios. Of course, the rags to riches 'I told you so' mentality of many of the individuals involved blinds them to this, and after hundreds of millions of dollars raised through dilution and often times a decade of work... they find that it's beyond their grasp or simply a failure. The success rate is low. IMO, with this redesign, the probability that CLBS will be around and stronger than ever in 5 years is very high, and there will be some dreams to sell along with the lab biz. Surveying the high costs and high failure rates of many similar companies over the past 10 years gives one pause to only live by the dream.
