As I alluded to, I conducted thorough due diligence prior to making a personal investment decision. This included but was not limited to speaking with the company and independent industry experts. Hint. It was not limited to reading a prospectus
I don't know how much experience you have investing in biotechs and interpreting trial results, but the following comment you made highlights the answer is not much: "If the new biomarker proves a success then the plan will continue, if it doesn't this will not be pretty. High risk IMO."
The biomarker selection work for study 6 & 7 is based on the assessment of clinical samples in a series of 5 clinical trials (4 successful and 1 inconclusive). Study 1 looked at 14 biomarkers; Study 2 , 32 biomarkers; Study 3, 46 biomarkers; Study 4, 20 biomarkers; study 5, the BUPA trial, 3 biomarkers for trial success but the data collection included 8.
Based in the hypothesis being tested - that the THREE (3) reagent combination alone would produce certain results, it was not possible to deem the trial a success, hence inconclusive and not a failure - namely it was "inconclusive on the 3 Reagent ColoSTAT".
However, imoirtimpor when incorporating the additional 5 reagents (total of 8) "results were encouraging in respect of the potential of a new combination of the assessed biomarkers" (read potential for further improvement from the previous trials with respect to early stage detection).
The research www.sprout8.com note alludes to the same - "the authors believe given the timing 2015-16 preceded the decision to vend into Rhythm and for Trevor Lockett to depart a CSIRO, that these results were compelling." in relation to the other reagents. Remember, Trevor Lockett was a 'Theme Leader' at CSIRO prior to the vend.
It is worth noting the P values for the sensitivity values for the previous trials were <0.0001. In short, the test has been proven to work with a higher number of biomarkers in study 1, 2, 3 & 4; so the company is hardly going to throw out commercialisation in the event the three biomarker test is unsuccessful (study 6), they'll just incorporate the lessons into study 7 design, as it is being used for the regulatory approvals, and increase the number of biomarkers to an appropriate (successful) level (max: the lowest of the previous successful trials). Not each additional biomarker adds ~$1-2, in avg, to the cost of the test.
Once again I encourage you to read the published results: Fung et al. (2015) Blood-Based Protein Biomarker Panel for the Detection of Colorectal Cancer. PLoS ONE 10(3): e0120425.
P.S. Apologies if my grammatical error in my iniatial post resulted in your misunderstanding. My comment relating to the prospectus related solely to SwiftySX's correct interpretation, and rather than me being "disingenuous", I added some additional "colour" & "clarity" on the likely reasons, based on our research.
Hope you don't buy anyway ;), as I am still accumulating at these levels.
Cheers,
5x8's
RHY Price at posting:
22.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
(20min delay)
