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Expect massive re-rate of Seeing Machines by year end

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Seeing Machines put out a positive year-end trading update today, without actually providing news of auto contract wins.

Fortunately, they are set to pile up over the next 6 months, with the company admitting it is bidding for a A$900m pipeline from numerous car manufacturers with 16 Tier 1s.

My view is that Seeing Machines, which has been working with the likes of Toyota and VW for years is set to take at least 75% of that pipeline. Indeed, one source (from outside the company) has already told me that A$750m is the figure I should have in mind, which would equate to over 80%. Another source (again outside the company) has recently validated my long-term bullish view on the company’s prospects in auto.

Of course, that pipeline will also grow as OEMs scale up initial contracts further. Indeed, the fact that Seeing Machines tech is now so much in demand must be the reason so many Tier 1s are now scrambling to work with it. They, unlike most investors, have seen the writing on the wall and its reads: ‘Seeing Machines DMS rules ok!’

That of course brings in the whole question of who is going to bid for the company and when?

With a A$1bn+ order book in auto set to become a reality in the present financial year, I’m sure informal approaches are becoming more regular. 

But Seeing Machines is traditional and I have a feeling any match will be an arranged one. One that will need the approval of the whole family of shareholders.

However, Seeing Machines needn’t be in any rush as its value should be considered in pounds not pence. I’ve earmarked the end of calendar year 2022 as the most likely date by which we’ll have some M&A action. By then it will be clear that:

  1. I’m not making this stuff up.
  2. Aviation is another cash cow
  3. VR headsets/mobile phones is a likely growth area for its tech. For instance, its technology seems perfect for the next iteration of the Microsoft Hololens, which only has rudimentary eye-tracking.

The exact timing of any offer depends, of course, on contract announcements and broker upgrades as companies generally prefer de-risked investments. Still, by the end of this year I expect Seeing Machines’ auto division to be almost totally de-risked.

At this point, I want to put in a plea for Seeing Machines to engage Morgan Stanley as a broker and to ensure Adam Jonas is the analyst covering it. It is a plea I’ve made directly to the company in the past and now is certainly the time to consider it seriously. 

SEE is a global leader in one of the hottest areas in tech. Waymo brags about full autonomy but in scale that is decades away. Long before then Seeing Machines tech is going to be in hundreds of millions of cars.

It therefore needs huge coverage in the US, where they naturally think big and fully value a successful global tech company. Who better than Adam Jonas to serve SEE up to the investment world?

Price

Speculating on price is a mug’s game. But then I’ve been labelled a mug multiple times for holding SEE for so many years. So here goes:

Personally, I think £1 is achievable in the next 12 months, provided:

  • VW/Toyota contracts are announced before the end of 2021
  • Someone admits we’re in Honda, courtesy of GM
  • Qualcomm reveal more about our wins together in auto
  • Volvo win is announced (Okay, I just put that in because I crave validation)
  • We get at least one firm aviation licence deal
  • We get Morgan Stanley (more importantly, Adam Jonas) on board

It could be a lot more by this time next year, if:

We get confirmation that our tech is being factory fitted to trucks

We get confirmation that Microsoft is putting our tech into the HoloLens headset

We get confirmation that Apple/Tesla is using us

An aviation license deal provides significant up front payments

If a bidding war were then to kick off, well it could even stretch to an Ayrton Senna. However, I’m sure a certain chip manufacturer or some Private Equity firm laden with dry powder won’t want a bidding war.

Soon, the institutional holders will have to decide: do they want a pound in the hand or a tenner in the bush?

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines.

Battle of the Titans draws ever closer

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I’m glad to finally get confirmation from Seeing Machines that the Mercedes S Class contains its driver monitoring system. Especially, as this website was the first to reveal this 4 years ago. The additional models announced today are all good news too.

Okay, we all know about NDAs and lead times in the auto industry by now but, as the deadline for mandatory DMS in Europe nears, SEE is clearly benefitting from a rush for its tech from OEMs.

The good news is that there is a growing pipeline of auto wins that I expect over the next 6 months,  My firm view is that Seeing Machines will (eventually) be in a position to announce wins with VW (and Audi), Toyota, Honda, Subaru, Volvo etc. etc.

Seeing Machines has effectively crushed the opposition and with the help of Qualcomm and Xilinx is scaling up its auto operations beyond the expectations of many.

It’s also making huge strides in getting its technology into the real world via Fleet and Aviation. More on that in due course.

My view is that overall it’s heading for A$1bn+ turnover by 2025. Of course, until the news is ‘official’ and house brokers have put the numbers out, there will be justifiable scepticism. Still, the exact number is less important than the massive revenue and profit acceleration path it is forging. That is now becoming increasingly clear to a host of sweet-toothed companies that would love to acquire a de-risked jam factory.

That is why I expect there to be a massive battle to acquire SEE well before 2025. By late 2022, early 2023, I reckon.

The leading runners and riders will doubtless include some or all of the following:

Expect at least one left field bidder, who could even start the auction off with an opportunistic bid.

As to the price? Well, my minimum is £1 a share. My maximum is £4 by 2023.

A warning: I could be completely wrong. After all, maybe it really was blind luck that I guessed about the Mercedes S Class back in 2017. Moreover, circumstances and stock markets can change quite rapidly, defying conclusions based on fairly accurate analysis.

If you’re in two minds about this you have to ask yourself one question: “Do you feel lucky?”

“Well do you punk?”  (2m 11sec)

In any case, do your own research before investing.

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines.

 

 

 

 

 

Teasing RNS from Seeing Machines

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Yesterday’s RNS from Seeing Machines had some of us hoping that it was alluding to   collaborations with Toyota, Honda and Subaru, when it said: “Seeing Machines is currently working with all major US automotive manufacturers to deliver its industry-leading technology”.

Somebody at Seeing Machines clearly has a wicked sense of humour and I dedicate this track Tease Me to them.

Well, the company has confirmed that what it meant was “traditional US-parented OEMs” not major manufacturers in the US (which would include Toyota, Honda and Subaru).

I’m not disheartened in the slightest as I believe it is working with major Japanese automotive manufacturers and will be in future models from Toyota, Honda and Subaru.

That would be a good RNS to put out. Take your time Seeing Machines as we don’t want to do anything that might double the share price overnight.

Time will reveal if I’m Nostradamus or more of a cut-price Mystic Meg.

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines.

Fisker set to use occupant monitoring from Seeing Machines in A$7m deal

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It seems that US electric vehicle start-up Fisker is set to use Seeing Machines combined driver and occupant monitoring system in its innovative Ocean electric SUV, with Magna as the Tier 1.

The vehicles goes into production in 2022 but Seeing Machines should get near term Non-Recurring Engineering revenues according to house broker Cenkos, which reiterates its 16p price target.

The deal is officially worth A$7m but, as we know from experience, these contracts have a habit of growing as additional models are launched. Hence, A$7m is very much an ‘initial’ and conservative estimate of its real worth.

It’s good news for Seeing Machines as the vehicle is set to be very popular and already has over 14,000 pre-orders. More importantly for Seeing Machines it further demonstrates its global leadership in the DMS and OMS space as it bags its 7th Tier 1 auto supplier.

Nick DiFiore, SVP and GM Automotive commented: “We are delighted to expand our customer base with such a globally capable Tier 1 supplying a highly innovative OEM. I expect this to be the first of many collaboration opportunities as we together target new business across the fast expanding interior monitoring market.

“Having articulated our detailed embedded product strategy late last year and launched our OMS roadmap soon after that, receiving this order affirms both our strategic and technology direction, and our continued leadership position in the DMS market.”

However, investors are really awaiting official announcement of wins with the likes of Toyota and Honda before popping open their magnums of Piper-Heidsieck Cuvée Brut magnum.

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines.

 

 

 

 

 

Waymo good news for Seeing Machines: part 2

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Interest from US investors in Driver Monitoring is set to take off as it is becoming clear that it offers the means to prevent the deadly death toll on US roads.

Adam Jonas, Morgan Stanley’s star auto analyst, published a note on 24 March, 2021, entitled: ‘What’s on My Mind? Motor Vehicle Safety — A New ESG Frontier’.

In that note he cited a recent report from the National Safety Council (NSC) in which it detailed that despite an historic fall in miles travelled and safer vehicle designs, the number of US motor vehicle related deaths in 2020 hit a 13-year high of 42,600.

Also, according to the study, for every US road death there are 114 ‘medically consulted injuries’, resulting in nearly 4.8m vehicle-related injuries last year.

That represents a huge, avoidable cost to its society, which the NSC calculates at a staggering US$474bn, or roughly 2.2% of US GDP.

Given that cost, Jonas writes: “We believe such tragic statistics may accelerate a range of policies (at the Federal level and otherwise) that may in turn accelerate changes of key ADAS technologies in the US fleet.” He adds: “The average age of a car in the US is over 12 years, amongst the highest of any developed nation in the world. We have long discussed the potential for taypayer/policy actions to accelerate the scrapping and replacement of US vehicles.”

His takeaway is that, while there has been plenty of focus on the climate-related impact of today’s vehicle tech: “We see scope for greater attention to be paid to life-saving/ADAS/autonomous related technology.”

Fortunately, Seeing Machines is at centre of this life-saving technology and interest from US investors is clearly accelerating. 

Moreover, as more and more vehicles are driven in the US with its tech (Ford F-150 and Mach-e, as well as GM Cadillacs) interest will only grow.

Waymo

This will of course be helped by Seeing Machines publicly acknowledging its involvement and RNSing such news. For example, as Colin Barnden of Semicast Research confirmed in an article this week, it has supplied its tech to Waymo.

This blog first wrote about Seeing Machines supplying Waymo back in 2018, still it is about time we had it confirmed via an official RNS — especially given the announcement by Colin Barnden. 

Regardless, I expect Seeing Machines to be rerated imminently (not a word beloved of its investors) as more US investors and analysts realise it is not a jam tomorrow stock but a jam factory gearing up production.

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines.

 

       

 

 

         

     

    

     

    

    

    

   

Has Airbus consortium won Aussie contract?

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I woke up this morning with a hunch, luckily nothing to do with an uncomfortable mattress, due to my subconscious putting together a jigsaw puzzle that I wasn’t aware I was even attempting to construct.

I’m wondering if the next piece of news that Seeing Machines will announce is that the Airbus-led consortium, to which it belongs, has been chosen to deliver a fleet of specially adapted H145M attack helicopters to the Aussie Special Forces.

If true, It’s not earth-shattering news but would further validate the importance of its pilot monitoring technology in the aviation sector.

In time, this technology may feature in flying cars and also spacecraft. All, additional reasons why the Battle of the Titans, may be kicked off by a bid from either Qualcomm or Intel in order to dominate the automotive space.

Quite aside from the prospects of a bumper pay-day for investors, the sheer long-term potential of Seeing Machines’ technology excites me.

Personally, I’d love to read an interview with one of the founders of Seeing Machines, Tim Edwards. As one of the visionaries behind the company he is probably best suited to explain how  eventually giving robots the ability to recognise and understand human emotions is going to change our world forever. It would be quite something if he eventually shared his insights in an article or, better still, a book.

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines

Seeing Machines bags Nio

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At the Qualcomm shindig last week, it was fascinating to learn that 20 automakers have selected Snapdragon automotive cockpit, gen 3, particularly as I believe most, if not all, of them will have Seeing Machines DMS integrated into it.

I’m sure that one of them is the Nio ET7, the Chinese would be Tesla killer. You don’t have to be much of a detective to work it out as the clues are all within an easy Google. Nio is signed up with Qualcomm and has an enhanced DMS. Hmmmm does anyone know a supplier of advanced DMS that is working with Qualcomm? Answers on a postcard, please.

Fortunately, Qualcomm also supplied a photo clue last week.

Screenshot 2021-01-26 at 15.44.20

I certainly would not rule out a Qualcomm bid for Seeing Machines in the future. Its technology has applications in markets far beyond automotive that Qualcomm would love to dominate. The more Seeing Machines impresses Qualcomm (and it got a lot of respect last week), the more likely it is to want to snap it up on the cheap. Keep watching.

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines.

Are Qualcomm and SEE climbing the Great Wall?

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It appears the share price of Seeing Machines is continuing to climb in anticipation of some big announcements from Qualcomm next week.

It would appear very likely that Seeing Machines via Qualcomm has made very big strides in China.  In addition, I came across some interesting news from Japan. Here are two snippets that may hold the key to the rise.

The first is news of Great Wall Motor in China. The second is news of Japanese OEM Honda installing DMS.

I don’t have definitive proof of either but I expect more good news very soon.

The writer holds stock in Seeing Machines.

 

 

Wameja low-ball takeover by Mastercard

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Well done holders of Wameja who held onto this stock and who have received a bid from Mastercard, albeit at a very low-ball price of 8p, well short of its 20p valuation from FinnCap. That is the price of holding only a minority interest, I guess.

Holders should hold on for the time being for 2 reasons:

  • 1) They won’t lose 0.5p a share as the offer price from market makers is currently 7.5p,
  • 2)  I noted the wording in the RNS today: “In the absence of a superior proposal” the bid has been accepted. There may be a slim chance Visa could come in to frustrate the process and set off a bidding war.

I hope long term holders of WJA as well as readers of my blog made some money out of this  stock, as Wameja was mentioned on Safestocks as a takeover play. However, it would be remiss of me not to acknowledge that FinnCap analyst Lorne Daniel put me onto it with his excellent analysis.

Lessons for Seeing Machines

There are lessons from this for private investors (and even management) in Seeing Machines, I believe.

Firstly, Lombard Odier, which holds 23.45% has accepted the Wameja offer. I do hope Seeing Machines is eventually taken out at a healthier premium. However, at its current price it remains vulnerable, particularly as Lombard Odier, via Volantis 1798, holds a jumbo 19.9%.

This also has lessons for holders of any share; there is an opportunity cost for holding a stock for years and years in the hope of a bumper pay day.

The writer holds stock in Wameja and Seeing Machines.