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Annual report is out.
http://ih.advfn.com/p.php?pid=nmona&article=59210385
There's actually been quite a few deals struck with options/warrants at much higher prices of late as well. I believe the last 2 sets of share issuance's to private investors during the 1st quarter of this year had warrants with an exercise price of .40 and .60.
I noticed that tonight as well. I think you are right, wasn't there before. 2 engineers and 2 scientist positions open. Makes sense though they will need people to work on the Alstom project from the MVTG side.
Only the most recent reported cash position (2/28/13) of ~$126k. I don't think Mantra's ever been sitting on large cash reserves since I've been around though. They basically seem to finance projects and operations as they go through share issuance by private placement offerings. I believe over the first 9 months of the last fiscal year they had raised a little over $1.1 million through this method and the O/S has gone up a little over 7.5 million shares (that does include some stock options that were exercised and a few other things of that nature).
Mantra really seems to do a good job at managing expenses though, keeping operating costs at a minimum. First 9 months of the fiscal year they came in at just over $1.1 million with almost 40% of that going to R&D and 25% of that going to "management fees" which are to pay Larry, et al. However the majority of those fees I don't believe are being paid out but rather being reflected as a non interest bearing liability to be paid out at a later date (when MVTG really takes off of course :). Other than that there is really no major expenses except for keeping record keeping and keeping the filings up to date.
Should have information through 5/31 readily available though soon with the annual filing to be done by 9/15 and of course the $600k+ cash committed by Alstom to their projects may reduce the need for as much share issuance this year.
I would a hint too haha! The Alstom deal was agreed to back on June 24th according to the 8k filing though, which means they may have been working on this together for 3 months. May mean it's closer than people think.
Yeah I arrived at the same basic conclusion, although the contributions specifically to the pilot plant are "in-kind services" in the amount of 250,000 CAD and not actual cash. Appears the actual cash amounts are going towards the project to develop additional industrial products from the ERC process. Either way for a company with a $5 million market cap a $1 million commitment from a major company is a huge boon.
Link to the Alstom deal if anyone is interested....
http://ih.advfn.com/p.php?pid=nmona&article=59142338
I was having this conversation in my head just now...what kind of offer would it take for Larry to sell off the ERC rights at this point. I honestly don't believe he would even consider $50 or $100 million so $5/share really may not be that far off.
Really cant continue to ignore MVTG at this point. The partnerships in place + the low o/s and market cap + the disruptive potential of the tech is just huge... A 5-10 million market cap just seems silly to me.
The terms of the Alstom agreement were disclosed in an 8k filing today and I was able to pull it on my phone from ihub. Worth a read.
Alstom isn't just a huge company, but a company heavily invested in the carbon capture process. I've included a link to their current partners and pilot plants operating for CCS and there's some enormous companies on the list. One of the biggest problems with CCS is it's hugely expensive, you have to install a process that returns no value, if MVTG can offer Alstom a way to offset the costs and provide new revenue streams for Alstom it's a huge deal for both them and their partners. There's no way to overstate how huge of a deal a functional partnership with them could be.
http://www.alstom.com/power/coal-oil/carbon-capture-solutions/partnerships-pilots/
Imagine there will be lots more info on any new agreements and such in the annual filing. Even if they happened post 5/31/13 they might show up in the subsequent events section. In their filing that the financials were going to be delayed they specified it would be done within 15 calendar days after the deadline. That would mean the filing should be done by this weekend.
NEWS!!!
URNABY, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(Marketwired - Sep 10, 2013) - Mantra Venture Group Ltd. (OTCQB:MVTG)(BERLIN:5MV) and its subsidiary, Mantra Energy Alternatives Ltd., announced a new phase of technology development in collaboration with a global leader in energy and infrastructure projects with over $5 billion in annual sales(the "Company"). The two groups will collaborate to not only further develop Mantra's current "Electro-Reduction of Carbon Dioxide" (ERC -0.43%, news) technology, but also to develop new processes that will see the conversion of carbon dioxide to other valuable chemical products.
"This Company is a world leader in power generation and carbon captures systems, and a partnership like this really verifies the potential of our technology," says Mantra's President Larry Kristof.
Mantra and its new collaborator will finance and perform research, while primary research activities will occur at Mantra's laboratory in Burnaby, B.C. The Company will additionally offer valuable support and resources in the study of the technical and economic scale-up for new and existing processes, and as a result will work closely with Mantra in the design, construction, and operation of its ERC pilot plant at the Lafarge cement plant in Richmond, B.C.
Lafarge's Bob Cooper (Vice President, Cement) commented, "Lafarge is pleased to welcome another industry leader to this project, which will allow us to build better cities."
Mr. Kristof continues, "The involvement of a world leader in power generation and carbon captures systems is a key piece of the puzzle to optimize and commercialize this technology. We are looking forward to our work together over the coming years."
Mantra is also pleased to announce that these and other developments can be followed at its new website, www.mantraenergy.com.
About ERC
ERC, or the "Electro-Reduction of Carbon Dioxide", is a form of "carbon capture and utilization" (CCU +0.98%, news) that converts the pollutant carbon dioxide into useful, valuable products including formic acid and formate salts. By utilizing clean electricity, the process offers the potential for an industrial plant to reduce emissions while generating a salable product and a profit.
About Mantra Energy Alternatives
Mantra Energy Alternatives Ltd., a wholly owned subsidiary of Mantra Venture Group Ltd., aims to become a world leader in the production of high-value, carbon-negative chemicals and fuels. Mantra is currently developing the ERC process, which will initially produce formic acid and formate salts from carbon dioxide, and will eventually be capable of generating a wide variety of products. The company seeks to simultaneously reduce anthropogenic carbon emissions, which total over 30 billion tonnes each year from fuel combustion alone, and generate value.
Mantra Venture Group is a public company quoted on the OTC QB under the symbol MVTG and on the Berlin Stock Exchange under the symbol 5MV.
Follow Mantra on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/mantraenergy
For more information go to: http://www.mantraventuregroup.com
Forward-looking statements: Except for the historical information contained herein, the matters discussed in this press release are forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements and are subject to risks and uncertainties. See Mantra Venture Group's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which identify specific factors that may cause actual results or events to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements.
I didn't miss the Noram announcement, was pointing out that they were expecting the design phase to take about 15 weeks when they hired BC to do it. I thought that was significant because 15 weeks from the cathode announcement would have been yesterday. Just another reason to be optimistic there may be significant news on the horizon.
"However, because ERC has not yet been tested at a commercially viable scale, there is no guarantee that any of the advantages cited by us will translate into actual competitive advantages for ERC over competing methods for CO2 conversion. Also, like other competing methods, ERC suffers from fast cathode deterioration, and we must successfully isolate or develop a better ERC cathode in order to gain a competitive advantage in this regard."
That's from last year's annual. It lists some other advantages of ERC such as the reaction rate, low operating temperatures etc. I just thought it was significant that the annual last year took the time to specifically address the cathodes as an area of potential improvement and within the following year they managed to take advantage.
If you're growing impatient the last quarterly filing was done for the first 3 quarter of the year through February 28th, 2013. It's available here http://investing.businessweek.com/. Just scroll down to the "Latest 10-Q" link.
Also a sidebar since I believe I've seen this come up on the board i the last few months. According to the filing as of 2/28/13 there were 53,283,140 shares of common stock outstanding.
Another interesting point of note from the filing I thought was that the agreement with BC Research was entered into on March 13 to design and engineer the demonstration unit with a 15 week estimated completion time. Not sure how the 5/14 press release about the 10x cathode improvement factors into that though.
I think we should be happy with that though considering last years annual filing said in order to gain a competitive advantage over other CO2 conversion methods an improved cathode would be needed. I'd say 10x more efficient fits the bill.
Agreed it's really not about what we have at this point. I think everyone here realizes what we have. It's about turning these great patents into revenue at this point. Really looking forward to those financials in the next few weeks as I think they will give some insight as to what the company has been up to and how "ready" we are to start to bring these products to market. That's what is going to make or break this company and I imagine as all the long's here are betting, that this company will be able to turn these great patents into a nice revenue stream before too long.
I don't know for sure obviously, but I've assumed that part of the delays for pilot plant construction are related to the May press release (included below). If Mantra came up with a new twist on what they were doing that dramatically increased performance I assume time would be needed to re-engineer their process and their pilot plant plans to include it.
That being side I'll be pretty disappointed if we don't hear something fairly soon myself as well.
------------------------------------------
5/14/13
Mantra’s Alternative Approach Yields Performance Boost
Seattle, WA – Mantra Energy Alternatives Ltd., a wholly owned subsidiary of Mantra Venture Group Ltd. (OTCQB: MVTG, GR: 5MV), announced today that developmental work on an alternative approach to its technology has resulted in significant breakthroughs. These breakthroughs will reportedly translate to a greatly improved performance for Mantra’s proprietary technology, the “Electro-Reduction of Carbon Dioxide” (ERC).
Results from this work, which is based on a novel cathode structure and material composition, show improvements in catalytic surface area, energy consumption, and pressure requirements. The new cathodes exhibit a catalytic surface area to volume ratio of more than ten times that of previous designs, and have the potential to reach much higher values. This dramatic increase in surface area will correspond to either a reduction in capital cost due to increased current density or a reduction in operating costs and energy consumption due to decreased voltage requirements. The cathodes further show excellent performance at atmospheric pressures and a significant reduction in pressure drop through the reactor. These reductions in pressure requirements will similarly ease design and operation and reduce corresponding costs.
According to CTO Patrick Dodd, “This alternative cathode approach, which has been developed in parallel with our conventional approach, has proven incredibly effective. We are only in the early stages of exploring its ultimate potential.”
Mantra’s President, Larry Kristof, commented, “We welcome Mr. Dodd to Mantra’s Board of Directors. He brings a good understanding of CCU technologies and will be an invaluable member of the team. We also want to wish the best to Tom Unger, who has departed Mantra’s Board due to health issues.”
Mantra has also announced that Mr. Dodd has joined the Board of Directors of Mantra Venture Group, where he will serve as a direct link between the laboratory and the board room.
Finally, Mantra is pleased to welcome UBC Co-op students Robert Mings and Koowarbir Singh to the new lab in Burnaby. Mechanical and Chemical Engineering students respectively, the two will be operating a new experimental setup to identify new products and thus broaden the capabilities of ERC.
“It’s great to have these two on board,” says Mr. Kristof. “Frankly, we need as many hands in the lab as possible to capitalize on all the opportunities presented by this technology.”
http://www.mantraventuregroup.com/Press/PressReleases/tabid/359/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/40/Mantras-Alternative-Approach-Yields-Performance-Boost.aspx
I imagine we'll be hearing from them before too long. It's been almost 2 months since the last PR and the longest they've gone between PR's is 2.5 months going back to early last year. Seems like there is quite a lot going on that could be PR worthy between additional patents, pilot plant, etc so hopefully we hear about some soon. I know I've been adding a lot the last few months as well.
Agree I am happy to continue to add in the .10-.15 range....and I may be the culprit for for the much bigger buy at the ask.
.18's gone and were @ .19 now....hows that level II look now?
Would be a huge deal I think if the US government gets behind legitimate carbon emission reduction. Just look at what the implication that the US government was going to get behind ethanol did for those stocks back in 2006. Seems like MVTG has timed everything right if they can get a pilot plant going, all the patents finalized and it coincides with the major world governments forcing companies to look for solutions to the problem.
Early activity was me, been around a few years actually but decided to add more. Not sure about the later in the day activity though.
Hey all,
For what its worth I've been following this board for a while, a year or more now and finally pulled the trigger today on some MVTG. Agree with the previously posted sentiment at 2 cents there's so much upside here its hard not to justify at least taking a lottery ticket on this. Low float and O/S, a great tech and a very nice partner in LaFarge in place. If they can clear the hurdle that every startup is facing (funding) then this thing could really run.
My guess is that the plea for short term financing through the convertible debt offering on the last call fell on deaf ears. Without someone to step up the company cannot afford to pay for the audit which means the auditors will not release the finaancials.
I would assert that IF LTC can receive adequate PE funding that long term the most value for shareholders still lies in dilution through PE funding for production. We all know the market for surgical staples ($4 billion) is huge and even grabbing a small % of that would lead to huge cash flows and profits. That is a big IF though.
It's not like these two paths are mutually exclusive though, company can pursue PE funding and if things look like they have reached an impass, they can simply then auction. As Bruce said in the call though when talking about raising short term funding for the next 4 months. If 120 days pass and LTC is still at a stand still something is seriously wrong. I hardly think at this point that 4 months is too much longer to wait given most of us have waited years.
Then again how many times have we heard just a few more weeks....
Hey NT, I believe the LTC ownership split on the call was 86% CSMG, 10% Dr.Kutz and 4% various other parties. That is of course pre dilution.
Bruce basically stated the audit was down to 2 or 3 final foot notes and also paying for it I think is holding it up.
Regarding Aegis Bruce said they bakced out about 6 weeks ago but did not state why. Also that a banking team had been put together to present to various PE firms and would be doing so in the next 7-10 days. Also that an Atlanta firm was in negotiations to possibly step in to replace Aegis also.
I agree with your opinions though its make or break time for CTGI. The next 4 months are all or nothing and Bruce basically implied as much. I do think though if you're considering investing a descent chunk of change here, I would consider at least looking into the convertible notes Bruce mentioned. At least that way your investment would have a DIRECT result on the company near term. They are available in $10k lots, carry a 10% rate and would basically convert to 2 shares @ 50% of the MV of the new CSMG after reorg at least from my understanding. I haven't seen the offer sheets yet. Also you would recieve a warrant for an additional share @ 50% of the MV of the new CSMG.
Again all my own opinion.
From the implications I got through the call the dilution is not going to occur in CTGI's ownership of LTC, but rather in CTGI's current stocks owners ownership of the new CSMG company.
So for example if you own 800,000 shares of CTGI right now you own 1% of the company. But you will not own 1% of the new spunoff company down the line. So you would own less through a smaller ownership of CTGI but CTGI would not own less of LTC.
Re: LTC Dilution
One additional point that I know everyone has brought up previously as well. Bruce stated LTC was still owned 86% by CSMG, 10% by Dr. Kutz and 4% by a few various patent attorneys and other people of that nature.
A few things I am optimistic about from the call.
Bruce basically stated that over the last 10 months the directors have put in several hundred thousand dollars of their own money to keep this thing moving but at this point are looking for additional short term funding from shareholders to keep CSMG afloat via the convertible debt offerings.
I'm not sure if its good that they are looking outside for funding now but the fact that directors have ponied that much up in the last few months I find positive.
Also Mr. Piazza sounded genuinely optimistic and excited about LTC's potential and there was a general feel from everyone who spoke that securing PE funding was not going to be a major hurdle. These again though are only my opinions.
I believe its going to be reposted online except for the investor questions yes. I dont' have a link though you could try e-mailing Bruce and I imagine he would provide it.
Just a synoposis for everyone who wasn't able to listen in. Also the call is going to be posted online for anyone interested. My take...in short everything depends on funding from private equity markets and the company is in need of about $250k for short term. I think i am more positive than I was yesterday but I still believe we have a long way to go. Also related to the funding below, Bruce basically said it would cover about 120 days for CSMG to keep up on all licenses, patents and agreements. If it takes longer to get the ball rolling on LTC than that then something is seriously wrong.
From Bruce
-company owned about $3.2 million from Don's tenure
-back wages to all Cali employees as well as taxes owed to IRS and state of calif for over $2 million
-100k owed for big offices in B of A building in corpus cristi
-20+ claims the company has cleared out
-still owe $800k (i gathered mostly to IRS and Cali)
-Atlanta and New York companies in negotiations for licenses and funding towards LTC
-Japanese company presentation in the new few weeks
From Mr. Piazza-6 months from funding to launch
-Still very excited about LTC
-18 months to the true tissue product it views as the money maker
-team still ready to commit
-still working on funding in private equity
-first presentation in the next few weeks to several private equity groups
Carbon Capture-pretty sure we're #1 for ADA (bruce's words) at worst #2
-ADA indicated they would like to be a strategic partner if this thing takes off
-Working on secondary markets like rebreathers
For CSMG-Spin off of company
-$20 million tax carry forward
-another breast cancer product in the pipeline from georgia state university
-rebreather about $500k to get to market
-directors all put in about $75k in dec
-since about $100k additional
-aegis backed out about 6 weeks ago which is why they are still searching for funding
-currently offering 10% convertible note (2 shares at 50% of new shares of CSMG which would be post any PE dilution) + warrant to buy additional share at 50%, used to cover need for short term cash
-7-10 days for LTC audit
-CSMG and CCTI need audits still
Thanks LM.
I'm very torn about adding right now. I can't imagine the BOD and upper management taking an hour out of their day tomorrow to beat around the bush and provide no new info about any significant developments.
I imagine there has to be at least something to reveal on that call tomorrow if its going to take an hour. I just can't decide if its going to crush us or be positive.
Call still on for tomorrow @ 11?
"Realistic" itself implies being of your own perspective. While I may or may not agree with you your views of the short term prospects of the company have been made very obvious. I only took issue with using the phrase "I am hearing", which implied you had heard something from company. Which apparently you did not.
Would you mind disclosing who you are hearing from? We all know who Lowman talks to as he has mentioned it in the past. But forgive me for being skeptical of a random "i am hearing" from someone who has always been on negative on this stock, not that you have been wrong.
Yeah I feel better knowing in hindsight I was SOL either way. I own 3x as many shares as I did back then though so looking forward to hopefully making $ on this again.
For what its worth I sold off my entire position at or around $1.50 on the first run after buying in between $0.20 and $0.25. It was in no way due to intelligence on my part though.
I waited until the last possible day for the trades to settle in time for me to have the cash available for closing on my first house. The only reason I sold was I needed the $ for the down payment. Also for what its worth what I saved by getting out while way up I have probably lost in value on my home.
I remember being really upset about it at the time because within a few days the run up broke $2 and I missed out on a lot of $. If someone was bored and felt like digging through February 08' posts I am sure you could find me venting about it!
Ninja was pointing out that someone could sell now and pick up major realized losses on this years tax return, possibly to offset other gains. Then wait the required amount of time to avoid a wash sale and pick more shares back up.