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Bullboard - Stock Discussion Forum Zentek Ltd ZTEK


Primary Symbol: V.ZEN

Zentek Ltd. is a Canada-based graphene technology company. The principal business of the Company is to develop opportunities in the graphene and related nano-materials industry based on its intellectual property, patents and unique Albany graphite. The Company is focused on the research, development, and commercialization of graphene-based products. The Company's technology helps filter and... see more

TSXV:ZEN - Post Discussion

Zentek Ltd > A conversation with the Zentek CEO
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Post by muffin17 on Aug 29, 2024 11:04am

A conversation with the Zentek CEO

Tuesday afternoon, I had a conversation Greg Fenton.

I met Greg at the Zenyatta display booth in Toronto over a decade ago, so like myself, he has a fulsome knowledge of the Albany graphite deposit and it's special qualities. Today, Albany remains an important, but just one piece of the company we call Zentek. Below I am going to try to document and articulate the information I learned from Greg during our phone call.

Shorts and the Use of Social Media

Lately, there has been considerable criticism of the company and it's officials on this public forum. I too am guilty of making statements and worse still, as moderator, letting others bash the company. We have all gotten frustrated by the length of time it takes to get our company to become a revenue generator. Greg is well aware of the frustrations and he feels frustrated at times himself. Shorts love the fact we are bickering about the company. Shorts use social media, like this bulletin board, to plant seeds of doubt amongst investors like us in the hope of creating a pack mentality toward the exit door where they wait to pick up our shares. They have the ability to see when we place stop loss orders on our shares and they run those stop losses regularly to pick up the shares of frustrated shareholders. Greg actually said he encourages shareholders to ask questions and hold the company accountable but cautioned against making statements that aren’t based in fact and pointed out a few examples where this has happened. Such things can be very dangerous and take on a life of their own when they are in fact false to start with.

The negativity expressed publicly on the BB has got to stop folks. We are devaluing our own investments. People are holding off buying because of the negativity, and I know this for a fact!!!

I have the ability to manage and curtail if required the conversation on this BB and I will be more diligent with fact checking posts. However, there is CEO.ca, the other SI BB moderated by Del BocavistaStockhouse etc I cannot/will not try to fact check. Hopefully folks who read this post will repost to those other social media sites.

PMRA Approval.

  • Collaboration between Zentek and PMRA is ongoing.
  • Zentek is working with multiple levels of government to get our ZenGuard coated filters approved in Canada
  • Zentek was informed that PMRA has approximately 1000 files open at any given time.
  • A decision was made 18 months ago to investigate opportunities internationally and found like the mask market there were too many different regulatory hurdles for our small team to do on our own, thus the need for a partner with global distribution.
  • Zentek is working with numerous filter companies, pursuing partnerships to move our ZenGuard filters into multiple international markets including the USA.
  • Greg acknowledged Camfil performed testing and was granted a UL listing for ZenGUARD coated filters. He couldn’t comment any further on the status of the relationship with Camfil
Review of Recent Polls

I explained to Greg that all four polls set new participation records and my impression that maybe we have new investors on board.
  • He was not surprised by the result of the Age poll.
  • He noted that the three top choices for excitement were the same three highest priorities for Zentek.
  • He was surprised to learn that 35 out of 52 folks have been invested in this company more than 10 years. I think he took a little pride in the fact that so many of us are determined to see this process through to the end.
  • His response to the AGM question was not so simple. He explained that numerous venture exchange companies have migrated to the virtual platform, this was raised by the TSX Trust company a number of months ago as an option that should be looked at. It was discussed at the board where it was decided to go this route. He was totally surprised by the reaction/backlash over the AGM format and said while it could not be brought back this year because circulars have been mailed. However, if the majority of shareholders want an in-person event, then it will be brought back to the old format next year. He also indicated that he is willing to host a live event for shareholders to ask whatever questions they may have…..More to come.


FDA Process Clarifications as Requested by Emperor

Below, I have simply extracted the meat of my response to Emperor this morning for complete context of my conversation with our CEO.

FDA has an interactive process. Before the process even begins, the Company requests a pre-consult meeting to identify any possible pitfalls, deficiencies in testing etc. Based on this meeting, the company determines what is needed for a submission. The fact that we already had approval from HC for our ZenGuard coated face masks was a big plus for FDA investigators.

That said, we are well into the process and the FDA did come back to us requesting additional clarifications on some of the information provided in our application. Our team is compiling the information now and will submit it shortly.

The short answer would have been NO Emperor, we do not go back to the beginning of the process. There is no problem with our application, we have a novel product with amazing qualities so naturally their scientists want to be sure the science to support our product claims are sound.

ZenGuard Coated Masks

The Canadian mask market for hospitals and long-term care facilities has been screwed for years as a result of over buying and long term contracts executed by provincial and federal governments, some contracts were signed for 10 years like those awarded by the federal government in 2020. However, the dental industry in Canada did not make the same mistakes. Greg explained that Zentek could not chase different markets itself and needed to partner with distributors.. For that reason, Zentek sought out the sales expertise of Henry Schein (HS), Medwell and Southmedic.

Henry Schein believes in our ZenGuard masks! The HS sampling program being run in Canada will serve as the perfect testing ground and hopeful spring board into the US and the rest of the world dental industry.

The US governments did not over buy masks during the pandemic and the US market is much more fragmented and not controlled by a few large players. The US market is 10 x's the size of the Canadian. Once we have FDA approval, HS and Medwell and Southmedic will have a superior mask product solution to offer dental offices, hospitals, long term care facilities and the public at large. Greg has cautious optimism for the future of the mask business for Zentek but indicated this Henry Schein program will be a very important indicator for the company.

Why is our Anti-Corrosion Gone from the Website?

Greg said there was a problem concerning the webpage developer. Effectively, it was an oversite on the web developers’ part that it got missed. Given there was no new information being disclosed to the market on anti-corrosion, it was decided to add it back once the contract with the website developer is renewed.

Anti-Corrosion product is full steam ahead, as per Greg. The ISC challenge has paid for the lions share of all the testing. Zentek supplied all the pigments for the testing. The NRC has completed their testing, and the results are being compiled into a report for submission to ISC to complete the challenge. Once ISC has the report, Zentek will be informed of the results shortly after.

On a sidenote, Greg mentioned the majority of the cost of ice-phobic testing was also being covered by other parties, including Pattern Energy and NSERC.

Zentek Promotion in the Stock Market

For those who do not know, Greg used to work for Scotiabank, National Bank and was an asset manager so I know he has the skill set and the contacts to get our name out to the right brokerages, mutual funds etc. When I asked about what he has planned I got the following:

  • The market is turning favourably for small caps, particularly outside of Canada. We are entering the phase where we should become attractive to the institutional investors
  • A regular guest on BNN's Market call gave Zentek a mention a few years back. This manager has indicated he will promote us once we have a recurring revenue stream!
  • Greg is working toward getting analyst coverage as well
  • There is interest internationally to promote us as well, but they need to see the revenues before buying in.
  • The promotional plan has begun with the enhanced social media strategy and direct to investors begins this fall!
He may have been throwing me a bone there with the promo plan comment or he slipped up. We didn’t even discuss Albany or aptamers, but Greg promised to discuss those next time we speak.

To summarize my thoughts here I believe we are getting very close to the finish line folks.

I hope this report sooths some of the concerns expressed here in the past few weeks.

VH
Comment by Zen2ten on Sep 03, 2024 10:00am
So Glad GF blew smoke on that conversation. You met him 10 years ago? But he wasn't even a CEO back then, just a shareholder. So how could he know much about what exactly was happening if he had zero insider information?  Virtual AGM is non-sense. Shareholders have been relying on in-person AGM's from this company since it became Zenyatta. To change this will be ridiculed because ...more  
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