2005, a pivotal year for Axis-Shield, with strong growth and profitability

Briefl...The slippage in Afinion was to ‘some degree’ expected, as the ‘full’ roll out was flagged already at the previous analysts meeting as being the second half of 2006 due to scale up issues, the delay might disappoint some, but robustness for ’commercial’ quantities are absolutely ’paramount’, especially when your partner in the US is a global player. Ensuring robustness should not be seen as a weakness, as any product recall (as discovered elsewhere) would not be received well by the POC markets Afinion is set to serve, even after any re-launch. Nonetheless it will be Interesting to get specific detail re Afinion. It is worth repeating that it is ‘key’ that the wording and focus is on sufficient system robustness for ‘global’ marketing. And the update does seem to indicate a strong order book with distributors mentioned as keen to receive the system in ‘commercial quantities’.


The second agreement with Abbott is significant, especially the development of Anti-CCP hence becoming available on ‘at least’ two high through put automated systems , which further supports my view that this product will contribute significantly to revenues going forwards. -