ERNI Flat Last Week

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The Edwards Real Nanotech (ERNI) went nowhere last week but there was some movement among the components.

The biggest loser was JMAR Technologies, down about 20%. On Thursday, they held a conference call to discuss their 4th quarter and yearly loss. Ronald Walrod, JMAR’s CEO, gave a presentation that might have been titled, “Hey, Nothing’s Working Out as Planned.” He was unusually candid about how delays in product development have led to delays in product marketing and therefore hoped-for revenues. He went through a long soliloquy about how the company’s BioSentry product for water testing doesn’t really work as well as they thought it would, and how a second generation model will be needed for the most general uses.

Well, Ron, nobody ever said being a tech CEO would be a bed of roses. I applaud you for your candor, if not your company’s performance. Here’s hoping you’ll have something more positive to say next year at this time. Meanwhile, it's hard to find a good reason to buy your stock.

Elsewhere on the index, NVE stopped its slide, Nucryst broke back across its $10 IPO price and Veeco continued strong.

Today, Arrowhead Research promised to sink another $10 million into its Calandro Pharmaceutical portfolio company, which is developing RNAi therapeutics (see previous post).