My view is BioMatt @seekingalpha has the business analysis wrong, but the sentiment explains the lack of enthusiasm for the shares.
BioMatt refers to the changing nature of oncology pricing, as combination therapies become standard. So,6-10K per month needs to get divided among multiple proteins. Whereas he posits that this makes the competition for Bavi fiercer, which is right, he misses the dramatically adjusting competitive posture of big pharma in reaction to the pricing for personalized medicine (as I wrote yesterday.)
Biomatt's main point of concern with PPHM comes down to cash, and I don't think cash is a problem anymore. Namely, competing big pharma companies each and all have an interest in tying up bavi under their control.
The very lowest level of a deal would be 60M upfront cash, along with milestone payments. Even if PPHM gets this easy-to-close deal, financing stress for the company is over, once and for all. When we look at the balance sheets of biotech in similar circumstances who have even this bare-bones deal, the cash issues become largely moot.
Richard Padzur outlined the oncology divisions adjusting priorities in his keynote at ASCO. It a protein has some value, in some situations, and if it's safe, then the FDA will approve it and allow the oncology specialists to determine the best mix of proteins for each individual patient situation.
So, to my view, BioMatt sets up a false scenario and then bases the article entirely around the false scenario. For example, if his thesis had been "PPHM is nearly certain to have 60M or more of new cash on it's balance sheet in a few months, plus a full financing partner for all bavi trials at all stages..." and then went from there in his analysis, then BioMatt would be dealing with the realistic scenario.
