The Aegea announcement is very interesting and a long time coming. This is one of TAUG's investments in a private company, the other being Serendipity. I have no investment in Aegea but do have one in Serendipity.
If Aegea test is validated as the Aegea and Biocept press releases indicate, then Aegea could very well become a very substantial investment for Tauriga.
I believe the original valuation for Aegea was around $10 million dollars. According to what Aegea told me when I was looking at investing in that company a test that can distinguish the difference between the flu and Covid commands a 4 - time reimbursement fee to the lab. A typical reimbursement for a COVID-19 lab test is about $105 per test. According to Aegea this test will get a $400 reimbursement.
Biocept shares one of Aegea's patents for PCR cancer pre screenings. Biocept jumped into Covid testing and went from virtually no sales to $17 mil a quarter.
A test that could distinguish the difference between the flu would be very valuable, take nursing homes and senior living centers as examples. Testing will not go away anytime soon, once PFE and Merc's Covid drugs are approved one would need a positive test to qualify for a prescription. The US has already ordered over $2 billion dollars of PFE's drug.
Go to a CVS and ask for a Delta variant test, they will tell you it cannot be done. If the Aegea test could differentiate between different strains, it could be a billion-dollar company.
Imagine what a company like Quest could do with this test. If Quest did 500,000 tests a month with a reimbursement of just $100 that would be $50 million dollars in revenue a month. At $200 a test it would be $100 million dollars a month. While those seem like pie in the sky projections, currently the US is processing over 350,000 tests a day, or almost 11 million tests a month. That is just in the US. Testing has a global market and Quest has huge contracts with large pharmacies and hospitals.
Emergency Use Authorizations are still being given out for Covid tests, but small companies will not be granted an EUA anymore. However, if a Company is able to manufacture 500,000 tests a week, they would get an EUA combined with the test results Aegea has produced. So they need a big partner or they have to go through the year long process of getting its test FDA cleared.
Just a little food for thought,it sure will be interesting to see how this plays out.
As far as Serendipity Ice Cream, I think things are looking encouraging there as well. Selena Gomez and GoPuff are also now investors like TAUG. GoPuff recently did a capital raise at an $11 Billion dollar valuation.
I hope GoPuff will look at distributing the gums and gummies.
Obviously, the core business is the CBD and other lines, and the huge value driver to shareholders is the Pharma trial for chemotherapy induced nausea, but these are some interesting tidbits.
This is not investment advice but just some interesting facts. I am still very long stock, but as I previously posted the PPS has been a downer the last 6 months.
Taug's stock holdings are interesting as well, VTGN AMIM and GOEVW all are looking good currently, VTGN should have a readout on its Phase 3 social anxiety drug in 2022. That is a multibillion dollar annual market. Most people should remember that VTGN had some dark days, it wasn't long ago that they did not have much cash and had a $40 million market cap. Now it has $100 mil in the bank and a $400 million dollar market cap. If TAUG's drug trial for nausea gets some traction this will be a very intersting story.
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