Sunday, May 23, 2004
Meetings, Phones and Shopping
The last few days has been incredibly hectic.
Firstly I had the China Nickel Outlook 2004 conference to attend. The papers were intersting, some moreso than others, but the overall message was that the nickel price is expected to stay high, and that price volatility in the nickel market causes problems for stainless steel producers due to the long lead time in being able to pass on price increases and the pressure by customers to reduce prices when the nickel price goes down again.
One delegate called for regulation of the nickel industry, but the LME already provides somewhat of a buffer for nickel production and supply variation, and probably does a fairly good job of smoothing price. It is true that nickel speculators can wreak havoc with this mechanism, but overall it's pretty good. Perhaps what is needed is a similar mechanism for stainless steel, where producers can hedge future production to create some sort of price stability. Of course this won't help those producers of custom steel grades or the exceptionally high grade steels, though their competition is far more limited, so price variation should be less of an issue for them.
There were some updates on upcoming nickel projects, some of which look very good, though most of the large scale nickel production is predicted to come from laterites. All in all, interesting, but not compelling.
Of far more import (as is normal at these conferences) were the networking opportunities, and Mal and I did our best to explain our technology to those who may be holding deposits, or low grade stockpiles that are currently of little value to them. The bacteria can get the base metals into solution in a much cheaper way than conventional treatment.
Most people had heard a little about the process, but we really did our best to fill them in on the details, and the potential of the process. Quite well received, and some great contacts to follow up in the near future. I guess we'll have to wait and see how everything unfolds, but there could be some very interesting times ahead for our company.
Outside of the conference, some additional meetings took place. One was a follow up of a long time development partner, though I think I accomplished more in a casual meeting over lunch than we did in the official meeting. It appears that the long term partner is actually very keen to use our technology, but they need to ensure that it is going to work at the full scale.
All positive, but I think a bit more clarification at the corporate level is required so that each company understands what the other company needs.
The other major meeting that we had was with a small company that holds some mining leases in China. It looks like a deal has been structured that will allow us to get our foot in the door with a fairly significant mine. It's a pretty unique opportunity, and we'll need to do a bit more work to get it all sorted out.
Right - Phones.....
Well, phones are interesting things. They can provide the glue to keep two souls connected, or in rarer cases, connect them in the first place.
Last night I had one of the most interesting, strange, touching and unusual phone calls of my short life. Two souls connected in an unusual way last night, and perhaps the playing field changed a little.
Not in such a serious way that it's now for a different game, but more like someone came and painted the goal posts, and fitted new seats to the grandstands. The grass was fertilized, and a fresh coat of paint.
I won't go into details about the call itself, as it's something that I don't think would be appreciated properly outside of the individual participants, but two people suddenly got much closer to each other last night.
To bring the blog up to date, I'll briefly explain my day of shopping in Shanghai.
Two people from meetings I had earlier today, came and picked me up and took me shopping today. We visited a few large department stores and I got to buy some really nice shirts and ties. 100% silk ties in China cost less than $20 Australian, which is an absolute bargain. I also got some 100% cotton shirts at prices ranging from about $30 to about $70. Not quite the bargains of the ties, but cheap nonetheless for business shirts, especially for ones of this quality.
I also bought a few gifts, and the Kosheen CD and A Perfect Circle CD, both of which I've wanted for a while. These are the genuine article, and are only marginally cheaper than Australia (by about 30-40%), but I prefer not to buy pirated music anyway. It's important to me that the artist earns what's due to him/her, so I'll part with a little extra money to get the quality and be fair to the artist.
I also bought a few presents for people, but one present that I was trying to arrange I couldn't. A little disappointed, but I'll look for another way to get it sorted out.
Firstly I had the China Nickel Outlook 2004 conference to attend. The papers were intersting, some moreso than others, but the overall message was that the nickel price is expected to stay high, and that price volatility in the nickel market causes problems for stainless steel producers due to the long lead time in being able to pass on price increases and the pressure by customers to reduce prices when the nickel price goes down again.
One delegate called for regulation of the nickel industry, but the LME already provides somewhat of a buffer for nickel production and supply variation, and probably does a fairly good job of smoothing price. It is true that nickel speculators can wreak havoc with this mechanism, but overall it's pretty good. Perhaps what is needed is a similar mechanism for stainless steel, where producers can hedge future production to create some sort of price stability. Of course this won't help those producers of custom steel grades or the exceptionally high grade steels, though their competition is far more limited, so price variation should be less of an issue for them.
There were some updates on upcoming nickel projects, some of which look very good, though most of the large scale nickel production is predicted to come from laterites. All in all, interesting, but not compelling.
Of far more import (as is normal at these conferences) were the networking opportunities, and Mal and I did our best to explain our technology to those who may be holding deposits, or low grade stockpiles that are currently of little value to them. The bacteria can get the base metals into solution in a much cheaper way than conventional treatment.
Most people had heard a little about the process, but we really did our best to fill them in on the details, and the potential of the process. Quite well received, and some great contacts to follow up in the near future. I guess we'll have to wait and see how everything unfolds, but there could be some very interesting times ahead for our company.
Outside of the conference, some additional meetings took place. One was a follow up of a long time development partner, though I think I accomplished more in a casual meeting over lunch than we did in the official meeting. It appears that the long term partner is actually very keen to use our technology, but they need to ensure that it is going to work at the full scale.
All positive, but I think a bit more clarification at the corporate level is required so that each company understands what the other company needs.
The other major meeting that we had was with a small company that holds some mining leases in China. It looks like a deal has been structured that will allow us to get our foot in the door with a fairly significant mine. It's a pretty unique opportunity, and we'll need to do a bit more work to get it all sorted out.
Right - Phones.....
Well, phones are interesting things. They can provide the glue to keep two souls connected, or in rarer cases, connect them in the first place.
Last night I had one of the most interesting, strange, touching and unusual phone calls of my short life. Two souls connected in an unusual way last night, and perhaps the playing field changed a little.
Not in such a serious way that it's now for a different game, but more like someone came and painted the goal posts, and fitted new seats to the grandstands. The grass was fertilized, and a fresh coat of paint.
I won't go into details about the call itself, as it's something that I don't think would be appreciated properly outside of the individual participants, but two people suddenly got much closer to each other last night.
To bring the blog up to date, I'll briefly explain my day of shopping in Shanghai.
Two people from meetings I had earlier today, came and picked me up and took me shopping today. We visited a few large department stores and I got to buy some really nice shirts and ties. 100% silk ties in China cost less than $20 Australian, which is an absolute bargain. I also got some 100% cotton shirts at prices ranging from about $30 to about $70. Not quite the bargains of the ties, but cheap nonetheless for business shirts, especially for ones of this quality.
I also bought a few gifts, and the Kosheen CD and A Perfect Circle CD, both of which I've wanted for a while. These are the genuine article, and are only marginally cheaper than Australia (by about 30-40%), but I prefer not to buy pirated music anyway. It's important to me that the artist earns what's due to him/her, so I'll part with a little extra money to get the quality and be fair to the artist.
I also bought a few presents for people, but one present that I was trying to arrange I couldn't. A little disappointed, but I'll look for another way to get it sorted out.
# posted by The Puppeteer : 4:44 pm
