Venaxis Inc fka APPY

[newtechinvestor]

What happened to the stock price is senseless. Did the company have its pivotal PIII fail? No. Dit it get non-approvable letter from FDA? No.
Company announced results that were slightly lower than previous tests, but the fact of the matter is it's significant enough to pass FDA in its present form according to the management (probably have consulted outside independent consultants).


A heavy weight in Daryl Faulkner is at the helm starting Monday. This is the guy that sold Digene to Qiagen for $1.6bil, 7 months after taking over at Digene as its CEO.

Here is what he said during last Q&A session:
______________________________________________________________

Thanks, Greg, and good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining our call. I just wanted to take a few minutes to talk about my recent decision to come to Aspen in the role of Executive Chair, some of my early findings and opinions of the company, and then several action plans for the coming 90 days that will lead us to achieve the strategic objectives of the company that I know you are familiar with.

I was introduced to AspenBio by John Landon, who joined the Board and was announced in December. You’ve previously heard that John and I had worked together at Digene where I was the CEO and a member of the Board, and he was a longstanding and highly respected member of that Board. Shortly after the New Year holiday, I was able to visit the company and begin my personal due diligence. In that process, I found a number of things that helped me reach the decision that I should join the company, and that there were a number of things that were doing well, that the company was doing well to create a great company. And as they did those things, they could change and improve healthcare practice and outcomes for my children, my grandchildren, and for yours, and in doing, executing well, we could significantly improve shareholder value. I made that decision just recently and nothing that I have seen so far has made me change that belief.

Several specifics helped me make my decision to join AspenBio in the role that has been announced. I found that the company had a proprietary and very promising molecular molecule and market for a significant, unmet medical need. The medical advisors that I’ve spoken to, including John Bealer who you will hear from momentarily, supported this through their own clinical practice and their professional opinions and associations. I’ve seen nothing thus far that would make me change that opinion. I found a Board and a management team that was passionate and committed to achieving the promise of this medical discovery, and in doing so, serve you, the owners of the company. With that dedication to the mission, I found a company filled with extremely hardworking and motivated and committed employees. That’s all on the positive side of the ledger.

But I also found some things that we could do better. The organization is thin, and as with a number of small companies that I see, several people are wearing several hats. As well as, and all well and good in low ambition companies. But when you have high ambitions, you must have the domain expertise and executive leadership equal to the challenges. The good news is that the Board had recognized this and began adding talent to the Board last year.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This really leads to the second thing. A function of spreading people too thin is that it potentially leads to gaps in execution versus expectations. We simply need to execute better, not so much because we’re doing things wrong, but because we have big ideas and big ambitions, and we want to align our resources and efforts to achieve those expectations.

And last, I found a company that needs to communicate better, with you, with the analysts, and others who follow our company. We simply need to improve our visibility with clear, honest, and a predictable communications rhythm.

Now, the good news here, all of these things are fixable. They are the kinds of things that attract employees and investors to great companies, and these things we’ll do. The Board has been very clear in their expectations and supportive in early discussions about direction. In the coming days, I will address each of these foundational issues without diminishing those things we’re doing well. In addition, we will aggressively pursue programs to get our strategic objectives back on track with the FDA-approved diagnostic test that aids in the diagnosis of appendicitis. I see no reason that this is not still a very real event and I look forward to speaking with you with progress reports along the way.