Opto Circuits' group company's partner bags CE nods for coronary stent

With this CE Mark approval, Micell preparing to make MiStent SES® commercially available in Europe

Eurocor GmbH, a group company of Opto Circuits (India) Ltd. announced that their partner Micell Technologies, Inc. received CE (Conformité Européenne) Mark approval for one of its Polymer Coronary Stent System (MiStent SES®).

With this CE Mark approval, Micell is preparing to make the MiStent SES® commercially available in Europe and other markets where CE Mark approval can expedite the registration process. The MiStent Sirolimus Eluting Absorbable Polymer Coronary Stent System is not currently available for sale in any market.

Micell’s Chief Executive Officer, Arthur J. Benvenuto, commented, “The MiStent SES® brings a new paradigm of safety without compromise to efficacy or deliverability. With polymer absorption faster than any other Drug eluding sytem currently available, we believe the MiStent SES provides a long-term safety profile of a highly deliverable bare metal stent.”

The stock thereby has reacted positively closing 2.3% up on the bourses at Rs 22.10.

Though the news may be positive for the company that has a good pipeline of products however the company right now has larger challenges at hand. Managing the large product portfolio and slowdown in Europe has made the things worse for the company. Not only the sales have slowed down the receivable days have increased substantially leading to increased concerns on working capital cycle.

In the backdrop of slowdown, net sales in March’13 quarter declined 31% over March’12 quarter and 26% over December’12 quarter. The compounding challenges with the working capital requirement can be understood from the ICICI direct analysts observations.

In a recent report the analysts had observed that the worrying factor was further slippages in the working capital cycle from 209 days at the end of December 2012 to 298 days at the end of March 2013, due to a sharp increase in receivables from 165 days as on December 2012 to 241 days as on March 2013.

The company has seen its interest costs double in March’13 quarter denting the bottom line further. The adjusted profits after extraordinary income came at just Rs 23.29 crore, much less than Rs 209.35 crore seen in March’12 quarter.

Thus the investors should still wait till the company’s challenges abate and it gets into a better financial grove to see the growth momentum return.