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Arecor is also leveraging its Arestat formulation expertise to create an attractive and well-balanced pipeline of
in-house and partnered products.
These are novel formulations of existing drugs that offer clinically significant
benefits, carry lower development risk, and have faster regulatory pathways to market.
The immediate focus
is on an oral peptide delivery platform (including GLP-1) and enhanced injectables, with these potentially
generating meaningful future income streams through deals and partnerships.
The initial emphasis is on
developing an oral GLP-1 with superior bioavailability to the only marketed oral GLP-1 available today.
With
positive
in vitro
data, Arecor is rapidly advancing the next stages of development with non-clinical
pharmacokinetic (PK) data on track to be delivered in 2025.
If successful, an oral GLP-1 with enhanced
bioavailability has the potential to generate significant value and, more importantly, validate the broader
application of Arecor's technology in the growing and highly valuable field of oral peptide therapeutics.
Arecor eventually strengthened its management team with the appointment of an interim CFO (made
permanent after the period end) after a delayed recruitment process.
During this delay it shored up its balance
sheet with a disappointingly deeply discounted emergency £6.4m fundraise at 90p per share and extended its
cash runway to 2H26, beyond clinical milestones.
VCT rules prevented OT2VCT from participation, but it
did bring in some new institutional VC investors.
At the end of the year, Arecor decided to close its recently
acquired but loss-making subsidiary, Tetris Pharma, whose lead product, Ogluo, was a glucagon auto-injector
pen for severe hypoglycaemia.
As with Scancell, we believe that the above activities, if continuing to be successful, will open up attractive
commercial deals in the next 18 months, leading to a potentially improved share price.
Diamond Hard Surfaces
Limited (“DHS”) was founded to exploit an ultra-hard diamond-like coating with
very high wear resistance and very low friction.
The initial application was for coating mechanical seal faces.
If lubrication fails, an uncoated seal will fail catastrophically within seconds whereas a DHS coated seal will
continue to run for more than an hour.
Whilst a significant number of customers use the coating, none has
moved to volume requirements.
The coating is a very good conductor of heat (3 times the thermal conductivity of copper) and is being used
for electronics heat management.
This application now accounts for about 50% of sales and the DHS coating
is now specified in several applications.
To grow the market opportunity, and generate enhanced margins, the
company is looking to develop its own products in this sector, moving from a service company to a product
company.
DHS has had an excellent year, with sales having increased to a record £569k.
At the year end, it held a
significant cash balance, and the company is considering returning some of this to its shareholders.
As a result,
we have materially increased our valuation at year end. DHS is only held by the OT4 Share Class.
Oxford Technology VCT Plc was one of the original investors in
BioCote
Limited (“BioCote”) when it was
founded in 1997 and it has since grown from a supplier of patented antimicrobial powder coatings to a market
leading antimicrobial technology partner.
BioCote’s technology is proven to significantly reduce bacteria,
mould and fungi that can cause material degradation, odours and staining.
BioCote’s premium additives can
be integrated into a wide range of materials, including polymers, silicones, powder coatings, liquid paints,
ceramics and textiles.
Covid was very good for BioCote, with everyone worldwide becoming focused on how
to reduce the spread of germs.
Sales and profits increased to an all-time high and the dividend increased.
However, post Covid, sales have declined to approximately their pre-Covid level and while the business
remains profitable, the most recent dividend of £13k was less than the £20k from the prior year.
Getmapping
Ltd (previously a public limited company and re-registered as a limited company in early 2023)
(“Getmapping”) has had a positive period of profitable trading, winning major contracts with large customers
and securing a long-term contract with the Geospatial Commission relating to the Aerial Photography Great
Britian (APGB) programme.
Getmapping’s product offerings are being well received in the market, and the
company is working on various strategic opportunities that should continue to bear fruit.
In September we reported on Getmapping's progress in retiring legacy debt by making repayments from profits
and by refinancing shorter-term financing into longer-term loan notes.
This process has continued with the
support of key stakeholders and – having cut costs appropriately while also winning several major exceptional