JOBS LOST IN FIRM'S U.S. MOVE

DAVID ELKS

12:00 - 02 July 2003

A Medical research company has shut down its South Cheshire headquarters, despite winning 900,000 of orders for technology to help fight the deadly Sars virus. An undisclosed number of staff at Crewe-based Osmetech have been made redundant after the company transferred its research operations to America.

The news comes as the company reported a boom in sales of a blood gas analyser to China over the past month to monitor patients with Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars).
A spokesman for Osmetech, which employs 38 staff at the town's business park, said the decision followed a 2.2 million deal to take over pharmaceutical giant Roche's sensor division OPTI in March.
He said: "When they bought the company they also took on about 50 new staff involved in research and marketing.
"It was felt that Osmetech is still a fairly small company and having research operations split between the two sites was not efficient."

Following the move, the majority of research will now be conducted at OPTI's headquarters in Atlanta, while the company's registered headquarters has shifted to London.
This will enable the company to continue its listing on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market. The executive directors will also be based in London.
The spokesman said that a number of workers in the North-West of England will remained involved in research while working from home.

The news comes as the company confirmed it had picked up 910,000 of orders for its equipment following the Sars virus outbreak in the Far East.
The handheld device cannot diagnose the virus, although it has optical sensors which can measure vital bodily conditions during treatment of its pneumonia-like symptoms. It measures blood gas, electrolyte and metabolite levels and can be used for measuring the oxygen saturation and acid-base balance in Sars patients.
Osmetech said this would be particularly useful in cases where treatment required the use of a ventilator for "supplemental oxygen" therapy.

The deal will help Osmetech, which is estimated by analysts Evolution Beeson Gregory to suffer losses of 3.2 million in the current financial year, push its way towards profitability. The orders received this month are already 10 times higher than the last financial year.

In January the company confirmed it had won approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for its sensor, which uses electronics technology to 'sniff' out bacteria which can cause miscarriages - a market worth between 900 million and 1.2 billion in the U.S.

The group cut losses by 20 per cent to 533,000 in the six months to January and is due to report its annual figures on July 30.

david.elks@thesentinel.co.uk

Excuse my ignorance. What is a T-trade?

Marty Boy,

It's the an extended settlement time some brokers allow.

It's possible to trade at e.g. T+15 which means that you order a chunk of shares today but don't have to pay for them until 15 days later.

You'll be charged a bit more than the normal broker's commission for the privilege, however it makes it possible to order a load of shares before results are due (hoping that the price will be rising in anticipation) and then sell just before results thereby making a profit on shares you never paid for in the first place!

OG

OMH closed near top today, if it break 5p & close above that level,it has some good story to tell, next price level? may hit 7p very soon, DYOR!

og,
Re-Omh,if at 7-13 pence range ,is in the final stage of its recovery,i think once the share price break pass this level,say 13.25p ,that is suggustion of a new milestone--begins of the growth phase story.To me it can be a multi baggers then. rgds SBR.

what a battle! If bull won at today`s closing session, the price should rocket tomorrow, if not?! JUST WAIT..... :-))

what is cx and what does it mean for the company ?

windy,

Check out:

http://futures.tradingcharts.com/learning/technical_indicators.html

SBR - I'm waiting :-))

I`m a bit surprise that the bear groups were SO strong in today`s battle!WHY bulls gave up ground so easily? If bulls do not reclaim some lost ground tomorrow, i`m afraid i`m wrong again !! (IT happened once approx 10 months ago.)

If results are supposed to be good this week, why did OMH drop 2 days before the
results are due.

Regards

MB

MB.,
OMH price did not drop compare to two days ago,what i`m not expect is : Bull
had`nt gain much ground since. rgds SBR.

Another negative day today. What is the prediction for results day tomorrow.

Regards

MB

Thanks for that og very informative site starting to understand things a little better now cheers windy

Results looking very healthy guys and plenty of buying going on today.

I'm surprised like SBR with the sells pre-results. This must have been short termers expecting a phenomenal short term profit like last time, selling out early due to uncertainty.

The good thing with this is that there should be few sells today which will should move the price into a new trading range.

og., refer to the company`s interim statement,i`m not convienced.what they `ve said we already knew! As an investor,i still kept 250k shares,will accum. more if they sign/bring in new contracts, as a trader, i`m out with a nice 40+% gains within 2 months. Best wish for you all. rgds SBR.

SBR, nice gain on the trading. From an investment point of view I think we are witnessing the start of OMH going places and with the new contracts which will come, 10p will be just around the corner.

OG

Og,agree about your point of view.This day, i try/learn to be a trading-investor rather than the oldday`s Buy& Hold investor! SBR.

I see there there approx 25m shares traded today how can you tell what was bought & what was sold.

Regards

MB

MB,

Click on the trades tab at the top of this page and type in the EPIC code for Osmetech i.e. OMH, you'll see a list of all the trades today.

There are always some unknown ones, if these are large and attract your interest you can see when they hit the market and look at the subsequent effect on the mid. price to work out if they were buys or sells. Some unknown trades are transfers between brokers and other deals which have no apparent effect on the trade price.

It was a close run match today with the buyers just in front of the sellers. I reckon most of the sellers (normally short term traders) will have got out today, so we should see a healthier rise tomorrow.

In the past OMH has normally been hyped up like crazy by short termers before results, who all sell immediately after the announcement or just before hammering the price right down. This announcement is different - the price actually went up - this means that the results were very good and show excellent potential for the future.

OG

Thanks OG for that. It was interesting. One thing that slightly concerns me is that the statement says that the second half of the year will be worse than the first half.
What are your views?
Where do you see the price in the next 6 months

Thanks

MB

MB,

The statement actually says:

"During the first half of the year, OPTI sales exceeded expectations at $5,582,000 (3,457,000), benefiting from approximately $1m of SARS-related sales to China early in the period and initial 'pipeline filling' sales to distributors. Although sales in the second half are not expected to continue to benefit from these factors, the underlying sales level for the full year should exceed expectations."

If the yearly sales are still going to exceed expectations then that is exactly what the market wants to hear. OMH have highlighted the reasons for the massive increase in sales in the first half and are very bullish about the full year figures. And what happens when the pipelines start to empty at all those new distributors? More sales.

I can see the price nudging up to around 7p in 6 months on the back of a bit more news/trading update/rumour etc. With news of new lucrative contracts this is likely to cause the price to soar to the dizzy heights of 10p and beyond.

OMH has always been that sort of share which could explode into blue territory any time. Lots of holders are waiting for exactly that time to happen before they even consider selling.

OG