Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to Research Frontiers Investor Conference Call to discuss the third quarter of 2023 results of operations and recent developments. During today's presentation, all parties will be in a listen-only mode, and following the presentation, the conference will be open for questions by pressing star one. This conference is being recorded today. A replay of this conference call will be available starting later today in the investors section of Research Frontiers' website at www.smartglass.com and will be available for replay for the next 90 days. Please note that some of the comments made today may contain forward-looking information. The words expect, anticipate, plans, forecasts, and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Statements that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements that are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions that are part of the Securities Litigations Reform Act of 1995.
These statements reflect the company's current beliefs, and a number of important factors could cause actual results for future periods to differ materially from those expressed. Significant factors that could cause results to differ from those anticipated are described in our filings with the SEC. Research Frontiers undertakes no obligation to update or revise these forward-looking statements to reflect new events or uncertainties. The company will be answering many of the questions that were emailed to it prior to this conference, to this conference call, excuse me, either in their presentation or as part of the Q&A session at the end. In some cases, the company has responded directly to email questions prior to this call or will do so afterwards.
In order to answer more questions of general interest to shareholders on this call, if you find that your question has been answered, excuse me, has been substantially answered, as a courtesy and to allow time for other shareholders to ask their questions, please remove yourself from the queue by pressing star two. Also, we ask that you keep your questions brief in the interest of time. I would now like to turn the conference call over to Joe Harary, President and Chief Executive Officer of Research Frontiers. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you, Paul, and hello, everyone, and welcome to our third quarter of 2023 investor conference call. First, let me start off by saying a number of our shareholders have asked about Gauzy and their safety and business with the war going on in Israel. Some of the questions: To date, has the Israeli war with Hamas impacted Gauzy's business operations in any significant way? Please comment on the effect, if any, of the war in the Middle East is having on Gauzy's operations in Israel. Is Gauzy currently producing and shipping SPD film coating to their plant in Germany? Gauzy has worldwide locations, but can it continue to function effectively if its headquarters location is seriously impacted by conflict?
Well, first of all, I want to thank all of you for your concern, and Eyal Peso and I and everyone at Gauzy really appreciate the messages inquiring about their safety. Thankfully, everyone is safe, and while I'm horrified by the situation in Israel and see things happening in the world that I never thought I'd see in my lifetime or ever, I can report that Gauzy's operations have not been interrupted by the war there. Of course, they pay attention to it. How, how can one not do that? You know, a good entrepreneur must factor in things like resources and competition. An Israeli entrepreneur has a whole different dimension of things to add to that normally, and especially right now. And Gauzy has been incredibly busy, both before and after October seventh.
They've been admirably, admirably juggling work and family safety and doing it with very calm determination. Everyone pulls together in normal times and especially now. They know they have investors and employees and customers, and they're depending on them. We've been working with them daily, and things appear much closer to normal than one would expect. As a matter of fact, the only reason Eyal Peso cannot be on this call today is that he has a packed business schedule, and that should give you an idea about business pressing on even in wartime. But once again, thank you, and on behalf of Eyal, he asked me to thank everyone for their good wishes and concerns. You know, the Tesla Cybertruck was announced in 2019, with production slated for late 2021.
Reports now indicate that production will start November 30 of this year, 2023. When the first prototype of the Cybertruck was demonstrated at a launch event, my friend Franz von Holzhausen, Tesla's chief designer, threw a metal ball at the bulletproof glass, and it cracked. When I first met Elon Musk in person, it was at the Model S concept launch event in New York, and prior to that, Tesla was making the Tesla Roadster with the body being produced by Lotus out of fiberglass. At another in-person meeting, Elon Musk was trying to figure out how to produce 10,000 cars a year. Well, in 2022, Tesla produced 1.37 million vehicles, which was a 47% increase over 2021.
In 2023, Tesla is expected to produce and sell around 1.8 million vehicles, far more than the 10,000 they were originally trying to figure out how to produce. So what do all these things tell us? That if you're in the automotive industry, even the most capable players don't always get it right, at least not right away. Sometimes there's technical issues, like the glass on the Cybertruck prototype, which incidentally, was not our smart glass at the time. Sometimes it's timing issues, as shown by the multiple delays in the introduction of the Cybertruck. But for the most part, a company that had never produced a car is now the dominant player in the electric vehicle market, with the highest margins and volumes.
In other words, things get done, and they often get done in a big way, but rarely on schedule and almost never in a straight line. This is the world of the automotive manufacturer, and it's also the world we live in. We are told time frames, and sometimes they're delayed, as witnessed by the first car to use our technology, the SLK Convertible Roadster, which was 5 months overdue. Once again, not because of our glass, by the way. Sometimes things are ahead of schedule. The SL Convertible came out with our glass, and it was ahead of the target date. Sometimes marketing plans change. Just six months before the launch of the Cadillac Celestiq at CES, the head of the project did not know when it would be launched and when it would be announced. It came out six months later with much fanfare.
So we do our best to operate in this environment, and we try to strike a balance between providing guidance when we can to our shareholders or simply waiting for something to happen and announcing it afterwards. So there's a balance there, and many people, including myself and our licensees, were disappointed to learn that an Asian mid-priced auto manufacturer had decided to move back the introduction of its special luxury edition for the first half of next year. We share what we know when we can, and often it is just what we're told. And in the world we live in, it's not possible to thread the needle in terms of timing. So there is that balance, and you know, the Asian automaker has moved the timetable back by about half a year, but it's still on track there.
Fortunately, we plan for such contingencies, contingencies to make sure we're not going to run out of resources before anticipated events happen. For the past 37 years, we've been debt-free. We have been successful at raising capital long before we may need it, to keep the number of shares outstanding relatively low compared to our peers. For the past eight years, we've been constantly focusing on reducing operating expenses. Some of our competitors are not so fortunate or successful at achieving the same thing, and we are rapidly running out of cash. While they may measure their cash runway in terms of weeks, we have over five years' worth of cash and continue to be debt-free. View is trading pre-reverse stock split at less than a nickel per share, and see it, Crown is at less than half a penny.
At Research Frontiers, we don't want our shareholders to have to speculate about whether our technology will make it out of the lab and into the real world. It has already done that in multiple industries. We don't want our shareholders to have to speculate about whether the technology will be high-performing and reliable, two qualities that are essential in any upscale market. Mercedes, and then McLaren, and then General Motors, and then Ferrari, all have proven this in serial production. Airbus and Boeing and numerous other jet and turboprop and helicopter manufacturers are also proving this. New products, in addition to the manufacturers I just mentioned, will be coming out. Since our last conference call, we added yet another auto manufacturer project. This one is from North America. Now, as a caveat for this new project, do we have an estimated timeline and volumes? Yes.
Will there be a straight line towards commercial production on that timeline? Maybe yes, maybe no. However, our long-standing experience in both this industry has taught us to plan for both, things coming out ahead of schedule and things coming out behind schedule. Let's go to the numbers. Our fee income was up 46% for the first nine months of this year. Automotive income was up 81% in Q3 2023, compared to Q3 2022. For the first nine months of this year, automotive fee income was up over 120% from last year, and Ferrari has shown healthy growth in sales each quarter of this year for their new Purosangue. Our net loss is substantially lower, and we're looking forward to becoming cash flow positive and profitable by executing on our business plan.
We expect revenue in all market segments to increase as new car models, aircraft, trains, and other products using our SPD smart glass technology are introduced into the market. With that, I look forward to answering your questions, and we took some of them that were emailed to us and included them in my presentation earlier. Here's some additional questions that were emailed to us… and in some cases, I'm combining several related questions into one. John Nelson had asked, "In the markets that the film is sold into, which market sales are growing fastest quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year?" Clearly automotive followed by aircraft, and we expect architectural to become more significant in 2024 and later years. Another question by Mr. Nelson.
Any potential new markets that REFR plans to move into?" Well, I'm certainly excited about our bread and butter industry growth prospects. More cars, trains and planes, you know, the traditional usage. As far as nontraditional markets, I'm particularly excited about the use of SPD with transparent OLED technology for displays, and alternative areas of the car to the sunroof, such as headlights, heads-up displays and sun visors. And in sun visors, both as an attached visor or built into the windshield. I'm also excited about some of the new projects for SPD smart glass and architectural, and we believe it's gonna be both in retrofit and in new installations. And I think that's gonna be very significant.
Next question: "Given the slow sales of EVs and no announced adoptions, the market for SPD may not be a high priority, considering, say, Ford is losing $40,000 a vehicle. The EV market is slowing down as the lack of interest stems from the lack of charging stations. Coupled with the auto strikes, I presume the royalties from the auto sector are now pushed out further. And also, why have we not heard about any architectural wins?" Well, thank you, Jeff, for that question. First of all, based on what's in the pipeline, I expect architectural projects, both new and retrofit, in 2024. And I don't think the UAW strike affected us at all. We're mostly in Europe and in Asia, and the strike is also basically over now and things are returning to normal.
Regarding EVs, I think a lot of companies were caught up in the EV development momentum and did not fully realize the economic and technical challenges. I don't think that'll help us, however. It will affect us, however. I don't think it's gonna hurt us. First, some companies like BMW and Mercedes, and Tesla, have a leg up on other traditional car companies trying to make EVs much higher margins than, let's say, Ford. Also, the same 5.5% increase in driving range for EVs applies to increased gas mileage for internal combustion engine vehicles, and is also added in ICEs 4 grams per kilometer reduction in CO2 emissions. So we'll be fine either way.
I mean, there's even an argument, Jeff, that if EVs slow down, you're gonna have to do more to reduce CO2 emissions through, you know, the reduction techniques of using things like smart glass, so it may actually help us. Although I'm not rooting for a reduction in EVs, I think, some are very good vehicles and some have challenges that eventually will be overcome. Next question: "LG is introducing multiple models of transparent OLEDs for commercial and residential applications. I would think that any used in windows in an outdoor sunny environment, we need SPD. Do you have any ballpark estimate as to what percentage of these different markets might use SPD?
Thank you." First of all, I agree that anytime a transparent OLED is used outdoors or with daylight behind it, such as turning the window in your home into a television or putting it onto a vehicle window, like BMW spoke about at CES this year with their SPD smart glass-equipped car that they demoed and highlighted at Oliver Zipse's keynote address, you're gonna need SPD film. Anytime there's daylight behind a display, I think you're gonna need it. I don't think anyone can predict today, including LG, the penetration rates there, but I think that the markets are enormous. And I mentioned earlier, it's one of the new markets for SPD that I'm quite excited about. Another question: "Hi, Joe.
In the Q1 2023 conference call, you talked about retrofit SPD windows, quoting me, "but we have a very well-established, mature, well-capitalized licensee that has developed their own retrofit solution for architectural, and we see that as being a game changer for architectural SPD smart windows, too." And then in Q2, I'm quoted as saying, "We haven't put a timeframe on it. I don't see any showstoppers and why it couldn't come out tomorrow if it needed to. And I think we're all pushing for that because I think we all understand that in the architectural market, it's a game changer." Well, thank you, Rick, for the question. As I mentioned earlier, this is one of the new emerging areas that I'm quite excited about and expect retrofit architectural applications to come online next year.
Just to kind of maybe put a little bit more detail into why I think it's a game changer. You know, right now, you either have to take out your glass and put in new glass, which, you know, in a residential application for a home is not that big of a deal. But for a building, a multifamily unit, which is the prime area for smart glass, you know, you would have to put up scaffolding if you're in New York, get landlord approval and all sorts of things.
So being able to retrofit it from the inside, like the system we have allows us to do, I think is definitely a game changer and would substantially reduce the costs and, you know, simply allow a building to be retrofitted, perhaps even over a weekend, when there's nobody in the building, if it's an office building. Another Jeff asked four questions. We've answered three of them. Here's the fourth. Does management believe the company's website is adequate in upgrading with fresh content and a new design is unnecessary? Well, thanks for that question, Jeff. We're a business-to-business company, so while websites are important, it's less critical than if we were a B2C business. And there I'm sure are some differences of opinion.
Some of the automakers we work with actually have complimented us on our current website, so I don't think it's affecting sales, and they know where to go when they want to get the best switchable glass. But having said that, and to put this in context, in 1995, when the internet was first becoming commercialized, we saw the potential. In 1995, there were an estimated 23,500 websites in the world. We were one of them, and I actually had to learn HTML coding because the current tools for web design just didn't exist back then. And today there's over 1.5 billion estimated websites around the world. Over the years, we've gone through multiple evolutions of our website, and while it may not be an immediate priority, I'm sure we will upgrade it.
While opinions can differ on our website, there's always room for improvement in everything we do. Something that we'll probably focus on. Next question: The Lucid car has a large sunroof, and I have read that they are complaining about the interior heat. Has anyone approached Research Frontiers for a solution? Well, thank you, Mr. Haughton, for that question. Yes, we actually have an ongoing project with Lucid to help them with this. And we're seeing heat buildup inside the vehicle is becoming more and more of a problem in need of a solution, especially with panoramic glass roofs becoming more common. And, you know, if you just go out there and look at the blogs, you'll see a lot of people are complaining about a number of different vehicles that have, you know, massive heat buildup.
I remember there was a wonderful video, actually, when the McLaren first came out, the automotive news reporter that was doing the test drive did a video, and he was talking about how the prior version of it was like sitting in a microwave oven, but how cool the SPD smart glass was in that vehicle and how cool to the touch it was. Anyway, today we've discussed a lot of exciting topics, and I'll now ask our operator, Paul, to open up the conference to any additional questions people participating today might have that we haven't already covered.
If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad now. You'll be placed into the queue in the order received. Please be prepared to ask your question when prompted. Once again, if you have a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad now. Our first question is from Francis Cortejo. Your line is open.
Good afternoon, Joe.
Hi, how are you doing?
Pretty good. Last conference call, you mentioned that the shareholders are gonna be greatly rewarded in this particular year, 2023. Do you stand by that statement?
Well, the timing is obviously off. Our stock is down.
Got it.
And as a shareholder, I don't, you know, I'm not happy about that because my net worth is tied up in this company.
Of course.
But I do, I do think that part of this was the delay in the Asian vehicle that we were expecting to have happen in the fourth quarter. And, you know, like I said, we, we take ownership of that.
Yeah, but with all the uncertainty, why would you make such a statement like that, Joe?
Because we were told, we were told that that would be the timing, and then we were told that the timing changed. That's the nature of the automotive industry.
It's the nature of the CEO to present himself in such a case that he doesn't bring all the hope together for all the shareholders. Don't you agree?
It's a fair point. We—like I said, we do the best we can with the information we're given. I mean, the alternative is just wait for everything to happen and announce it after the fact. But I think that a lot of people would prefer to get at least a sense as to the directions that we're moving in and the progress we're making.
A lot of people would-
And I'll admit, it was a judgment call, and I was wrong on that one.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from John Nelson. Your line is open.
Hi, Joe.
Hey, John.
Hi.
By the way, thank you for your renewed investment in the company.
Well, you know, it's all about potential, so I am feeling good about my investment in Research Frontiers. The press release states that fee income during the first nine months was up 46% versus last year, nine months last year. And then t he income from, for the third quarter was up 9% quarter, compared to last year's quarter. What accounted for the difference?
Why the difference?
Yeah.
Yeah. A lot of it is timing. I mean, when you're comparing quarter to quarter, there could be specific events in one particular quarter last year that, you know, where there was a blip up. And, you know.
When you take a longer period of time, like nine months versus nine months, you get, it's a little more smoothed out, and that's why, you know, the automotive income was up substantially for the nine months.
Okay, good.
And also, as I mentioned earlier, I think, you know, you started to see Ferrari really kick in, you know, with good growth in the adoption of SPD this year.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks a lot.
As a reminder, if you do have a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad now. Our next question comes from Art Brady. Your line is open.
Hi, Joe. Art Brady here.
Hey, Art.
Can you give us a little picture on when the actual billings would start with LG?
All of our license agreements have a provision that the licensee typically pays us 45 days after the end of the quarter in which a product is sold. So, you know, there may be products sold as part of the development process and things like that, but the real numbers come in when it hits the consumer markets, just like automotive, just like aircraft, just like architectural.
So that would mean starting maybe, early January?
When they decide to introduce the products, that's when you'll start to see, you know, revenues kick in. And, you know, understand there's also a lot of licensees have to achieve a minimum royalty before you see additional income. And they would have to exceed the minimum royalty for the year before you start having accretive new income. So, you know, just to use numbers, if somebody had a $100,000 minimum royalty, that means, and a 10% royalty, let's say, for automotive, you only see new revenue come in after they've achieved $1 million in sales of product, which would generate a $100,000 in royalty income. Then, you know, the next dollar after that generates another, you know, additional revenue.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks a lot, Art.
All right. And if there are any final questions, please press star one on your phone now. And we have a question from David Paradiso. Your line is open.
Hi, Joe.
Hey, Dave.
I've been a shareholder for 29 years now, and still waiting. Given that the price of the stock is where it is, I'm concerned once again about delisting. Can you talk about the timing of when REFR could be delisted and ramifications and all that?
Sure. So, first of all, I don't expect it to happen. I don't think we're gonna have to do what our two competitors did with a 60-to-1 reverse stock split just to get their stock over $1. One of them has already drifted down and got another delisting notice. But, you know, typically the Nasdaq rules require that if you trade below $1 for a certain period of time, then you have 180 days to come into compliance and trade above $1. If that doesn't happen, typically there's another 6-month period that's granted. You know, usually what companies have done is do things like what View and Crown did, which is reverse stock splits to try to get their stock above $1.
I don't expect that to happen. I think we're kind of in a period where there hasn't been any news, and I'm pretty confident that there will be good news, you know, well within the timeframe I just mentioned. So I'm not at all even thinking about it.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks a lot, Dave.
Our next question comes from David Forster. Your line is open.
Well, actually, it's Michael Forster, if you can hear me?
It's Michael Forster. Hey, hi, how are you doing, Michael?
I apologize, sir. Michael Forster.
In regard to, we had two suppliers of the film, Gauzy for one, and Hitachi, which I think sold off its interest. Is there a problem in getting people to adopt the SPD technology because of a lack of multiple suppliers?
No, there's more to the Hitachi story, which I think people will be pleased with when they hear about it. But, but no, we haven't encountered that. What the automakers, especially where they like to have multiple suppliers, have been focusing on is on multiple sources of lamination. So do they have a glass laminator that which is the person that sets, you know, the company that sets the price for the automaker, you know, for things like sunroofs. It's having multiples in that part of the supply chain that has been important, and, you know, we have basically the who's who of the auto glass industry licensed. So, the automakers seem very comfortable with everything. And this recent North American project, you know, we went through a good list of potential licensees to supply the project, and, you know, they were all companies that the automaker would, you know, welcome working with. So it's been fine.
Well, well, you brought up at the beginning the, you know, problems in Israel right now. I'm just, it strikes me that if it's realistically that Gauzy is the only producer of volume of film, there's a limit on what Gauzy can currently produce, and maybe they haven't hit the limit yet, but is that a barrier? Do you get that feedback from potential customers?
No, I don't. It's a fair question, though. You know, so let me delve a little bit deeper into that, you know, maybe give people some comfort on that. So Gauzy actually has locations throughout the world, it's not just in one place. And they also have multiple locations, even within Israel. So if God forbid something happened to their main facility in Tel Aviv-Yafo, and I've seen the Iron Dome at work, and it works quite well. So it's a low chance in a populated area like that of something striking. But even if it did, there's a facility not 10 minutes away that things can be moved to. And then there's also facilities in Germany and other places that can house it.
So, you know, they unfortunately, the world they live in, you know, involves contingency planning that we don't have to do in New York, at least right now. Thankfully, not right now. So, you know, it's very much part of their strategic planning to, to be able to deal with situations like that. And
I have another.
Sure.
Yeah. On, you know, you've talked about the reduction of costs. That's primarily administrative or internal, and I-
At Research Frontiers. Yeah, at Research Frontiers. The other focus on cost is at the end product side, and there we've gotten the cost of the SPD film to a fraction of what it was in the beginning.
Well, I'll preface my question with, I understand you have contracts with various licensees, and I presume, and correct me if I'm wrong, that a typical provision is that the licensee gets the cheapest price that's offered to any licensee now or in the future.
No.
No?
No.
Okay.
There's no most-favored-nations provisions. But you know, with volume, you get discounts, and if somebody is developing a large use of SPD film, for example, they'll get a better price, I'm sure, from Gauzy than someone that's, you know, doing a couple of, you know, windows.
Well, our return, as I understand it, is typically 10%.
10% in automotive, 15% in the other markets of the revenue.
In that regard, if we offered, you know, 9.5% to a big buyer, so that it increases the use of the product and gets other competitors of that buyer interested in competing, has that been considered as a way of even though we lose some revenue, in the short run?
It's certainly—I mean, look, that's an excellent question. Maximizing revenue, because we get paid based on revenue, is positive for Research Frontiers. So going from, let's say, 10%-9.5%, if there was huge volumes in a product that someone could commit to, is definitely something we've considered and discussed. The issue, though, is that for that to happen, the licensee has to commit to large volumes, and for that to happen, their automotive customer has to commit to large volumes. So they have to either make the standard equipment, then you know how much glass you're putting in a vehicle and how much of it is smart glass, or commit to a certain make rate.
So you know, once again, how much glass you're putting or, you know, the way it is now, it's the customer deciding the configuration of what cars they want. And, and that's less predictable for the automaker, obviously, and less predictable for, you know, for the glass laminating licensee. So, you know, if someone's willing to make a commitment, we certainly would consider a reduction if it was an impediment or if we can get more, more revenue out of it, because our costs are basically fixed.
Last topic. I see that there's warrants were purchased. Can you tell us what the lowest cost price to purchase stock of Research Frontiers by a warrant holder?
I'd have to look. I don't have that number in front of me. It's in our 10-Q, though, the weighted average and the exercise price of the warrants. Some go as high as $4 or $5.
Yeah.
Some are exercisable at $4, $4.30, you know, some are exercisable at lower prices. No warrants were purchased, though. I mean, there were some that were exercised, you know, in the first nine months of this year because they were in the money. But I think that was at $1.38, if I remember right, per share.
All right, well, last question. Are there any warrant holders who could purchase stock now at a price less than the market?
No.
All right. Thanks.
Thanks a lot, Michael.
We have a question from John Nelson. Your line is-
Hi, Joe. Hi, hi, Joe.
Yeah.
This is a follow-up. Earlier in the call, you mentioned a project near and dear to both of us, due to the massive potential size of the market. The visor project, either attached or built into-
Or built into the windshield, right?
Yeah. Can you share, without naming names, can you share any further details on the visor project?
I could probably talk about what's been public, only.
Okay.
In the McLaren, there's one version of the McLaren that has what's called a Cielo roof, which is a panoramic roof that kind of wraps down into the windshield of the car, if you can imagine.
So that band between, you know, the windshield and the roof is not metal, it's a curved piece of glass. And they've actually done the sun visor built into that. It's been done in low volume. And for other manufacturers that have much higher volumes, we've had development projects building that into the windshield itself. And what's cool about that, John, is that you can actually do multi-segmented multiple segments in the sun visor. So then if you combine that with, let's say, a photo cell that detects where the-
Hello? Hello?
I'm sorry, Mr. Harary, we seem to have lost you.
Okay. Is that better now?
Yes, you're back, sir.
Okay. Thank you. Yeah, so you could adjust the sun, which segment of the sun visor actually goes up and down, or goes dark or light with a photo cell when you build it into the windshield.
All right. Thank you. Our next question comes from Alan Ginsburg.
Okay.
Your line is open.
Yeah. Hello, Joe. How are you?
Hi, Alan. How are you?
I'm good. My question is a follow-up to one of the previous questions, and that has to do with suppliers. Now, I understand what you said about fabricators, et cetera, but, I'm sure that end users also look at the situation in Israel. So you mentioned Hitachi, and that we'll be hearing something, and I'm very interested in that as a second supplier. So can you give us a little more color on that?
At this point.
Hello?
Mr. Harary, I think we've lost you again. Ladies and gentlemen, please stand by. We're having technical difficulty. Mr. Harary, are you there?
Mr. Harary, can you hear us? Once again, ladies and gentlemen, please stand by. We're just having a bit of technical difficulties. We'll have Mr. Harary back in one second. Thank you. Mr. Harary, you're back.
Okay, thank you. I apologize. We had a voice over internet issue, and I think it's been resolved now.
Hello?
Yes. Can you hear me?
Yeah, am I on the line with you now, Joe? It's Alan.
You still are. Okay.
Yeah. Sorry, I had asked. Hi. Hi. I had asked you about Hitachi, and that's when we got cut off.
Okay. Yeah. At this point, I'm not able to give more details about that, but I think everyone will be very happy with some of the details when they do come out, and hopefully there will be a time soon when I can do that.
Is that a near-term thing, that we might hear something about it?
It's not within my control, but it could be very near term.
Okay. That's important to me. Thank you.
You're welcome.
As a reminder, if there are any final questions, please press star one on your phone now. We have a question from Tom Smith. Your line is open.
Hi, Joe.
Hi, Tom. How are you?
Good, good. So as you've probably seen, there was rumors the Cybertruck might have some sort of electrochromic. You opened the conference call mentioning the Cybertruck, then you mentioned not at that time, it didn't have SPD. I don't think investors have much.
I don't want you to read too much into that.
Okay.
It was more of a vehicle that came out from a very reputable and innovative auto manufacturer that had its share of delays and technical issues, too.
I agree.
But it's just the world we live in.
Making sure.
Thanks for asking that.
Yeah. And, and then how about Rivian? Anything on Rivian talk? Because they're, they seem to be growing, and they had shown SPD before.
Yeah, they had shown SPD, and we hope that they will show it again because they are having issues with the heat buildup inside the vehicle. So, you know, we-
Okay.
We're out there as a solution for many, many people.
As far as the Honda, you said first half, I mean, that's kind of a large timeframe. Do you have... Is it more towards Q1 or Q2, or you just have no idea?
You know, I'm reluctant to give more of a precise timing, because last time I did, I was called out on it.
Yeah.
f you don't mind, I got to leave it somewhat long term.
Has there been any more?
Yeah, first half, you know, we're talking about within the next, you know, 6-8 months.
Has there been any more confirmation on it, or does it stand where the confirmation was before, or is it looking more certain, or you can't say, or you don't know?
It's looking more certain, but, you know, like I said, I'm reluctant to make any predictions given the fact that, you know, one of them just bit me in the butt.
Okay. All right. Thank you.
Thanks.
Thank you. We have a question from John Nelson. Your line is open.
Hi, we got, Joe, we got cut off.
Sorry about that, John.
Don't know what happened.
We had an internet issue that he said.
Did I miss anything on comments? Any more comments on the or details on the visor project?
Other than, you know, we have development efforts in the past and currently, both in the windshield and as a standalone, and that McLaren had actually put it in series production.
You can have a system where it detects where the sun is on the horizon and decides which segment to darken and lighten based on, you know, where the sun is. So, you know, it's something that I, I think is a, a very good application and something near and dear to my heart as well.
Okay.
As someone who drives quite a bit.
Are the partners that you're in project with this one partner for both fixed and attached, or two partners?
Different.
Okay.
Different, different, different licensees.
Okay. Excellent. Thank you very much.
Thanks. Thanks a lot, John.
Our next question is from Tom McCarthy. Your line is open.
Hi, Joe.
Hey, Tom. How are you?
Good. Enjoying retirement. As a former financial advisor, I’m very aware that the investment community is going to be looking at Research Frontiers and painting it with the same brush as it did View and Crown and other similar companies or similar products that aren't going to be successful. In other words, Research Frontiers is going to have to do a good, strong, aggressive PR initiative, I believe, to really get the investment community to take a serious look at it. What are the plans to do that?
Sure. So that, that's a fair question and something that, you know, both we and Gauzy incidentally have, you know, discussed, you know, many, many times in terms of that. There are big differences between us and Crown and us and View. First of all, the economics. View is a bad company, in my opinion, because the technology doesn't perform well, and they had an accounting fraud issue, and it's not for lack of sales, it's for lack of performance, and they highly subsidize their sales, so they lost $250 million in cash last year. We didn't. So, and, and I could pretty much assure you that there's nobody in our supply chain that is building a business around that business model of highly subsidizing to the point of losing massive amounts of money. It's just not in anyone's DNA.
Every project has to stand on its own economically, and it will. And that's one of the key differences in it. Crown doesn't have a product that came out the door, so I don't think anybody's comparing us to them. There have been a lot of promises over the years in moving goalposts and things like that, but their, their smart window insert has not come out yet, and it's always around the corner. So I don't think we have to worry too much about that. And, you know, you have things like the Dynamic Glass Act, that's part of the IRA, that, you know, is giving tax credits for smart windows, so that changes the economics also in our favor. So I wouldn't really say that View is a fair comparison.
I think that it's certainly something that we and Gauzy have to work to distinguish ourselves from, and we do.
Yes.
But it's not a direct comparison. And, you know, I've been, in the last 3-4 conference calls, pointing out from time to time some of the differences between us and them. But on the marketing side, you have a window that goes darker, goes lighter, and switches faster. It's not a direct comparison. We're much better performing than them. It's a film which makes the logistics easier, which means we don't have to ship glass across the world. We could ship film, and have it laminated locally. So there's a lot of things that are different, and we point that out to the customers.
I know that, and there are major differences. I'm not talking about potential customers. I'm talking about brokerage firms and newsletter writers and research services. Excuse me. You know, they can be very superficial when they're looking at something new. And, you know, the inclination is going to be to think that REFR is another View or another Crown. My point is-
Yeah, except that, except that, you know, except that anybody that does even more of a superficial than superficial analysis will see we're not losing $250 million a year in cash, we're not subsidizing the product, and we're in multiple industries. So it's a little bit different.
Good point.
But, you know-
It's very different.
Yeah.
The point I'm trying to make, I guess, and I'm sorry, I'm belaboring this, is you can't expect the folks I'm talking about to come to you unless you've gone to them, so to speak, unless you've-
Right. And I think, yeah, yeah, and there is a messaging and PR initiative that is being launched that you'll see as well.
Terrific. Okay, keep up the good work, Joe.
Thanks. Thanks, and I appreciate the question.
Our next question is from Gerard Sherman of Strategic Planning Group. Your line is open.
Thank you. Hey, Joe, at what point do you, yourself, or the board or any other insiders feel that it's a fairly cheap price to purchase the shares in the open market? I can't think of a better way, if you can't control any other news, of supporting the stock, just to put your own money in it.
Yeah. Well, some of our, you know, directors have purchased stock. There's, at any given time, different levels of information within the company that would restrict people also from buying it. I'm sure you're familiar with windows opening and closing. And, you know, right now, the window is closed. It may open up soon. It may not.
Yeah, I just-
But we don't have free rein to purchase any time we want because, you know, the insider trading rules that apply.
I understand that, but I mean, it's been years since there's been news other than a Ferrari. I'm sure there's been plenty of windows that you guys could have dabbled, and other than a few thousand shares here or there, which is not really an impactful purchase, I, I just think that it would bode us all well if you guys stepped up and actually purchased some shares in the open market.
Yeah. Well, I agree, and we try to do what we can do when we can do it. You know, also, within the last year was a, you know, fairly significant event that was expected to be right on the horizon, which would have made any kind of purchase inopportune. So, you know, you do have restrictions, you know, even within a long period of time. But I hear what you're saying, and I appreciate the question.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks.
Thank you. And seeing no further questions, I'll turn the call back over to Mr. Harary for final comments.
Thanks. I'm gonna make a few closing remarks, and thank you, Paul. This year, our fee income was up 46% for the first nine months of the year, with automotive income up 81% quarter-over-quarter and up over 120% for the first nine months of the year compared to last year. Ferrari has shown healthy growth in sales in each quarter of this year for the Purosangue, and that uses our SPD-SmartGlass in the roof, and I'm told that further growth is expected in sales in the fourth quarter. We expect revenue in all market segments to increase as new car models, aircraft, trains, architectural, and other products using our SPD-SmartGlass are introduced into the market. We're very much on our way of becoming cash flow positive and profitable by executing on our business plan.
Now, there's a lot of analogies between sports and business, and perhaps I'm just making this analogy because I have the World Series on my mind. But in baseball, less than 2.7% of games are won at the end with a walk-off home run. And in football, less than 10% of Hail Mary passes are completed. Statistically, baseball games and division titles are won mostly by hitting singles. And if you're investing in Research Frontiers based on the batter getting a grand slam home run, it has happened several times, but it's much more likely that your success will come from the singles and doubles and triples that we've hit and all the preparation that has gone into that.
We have longstanding seeds placed throughout many industries, and I'm pretty sure that we're well on our way to victory and have a very good team of players throughout the world to get us there. In keeping with the sports analogy, some of the players on the opposing team are on the injury list and may have even had some career-ending mistakes, but not us. We'll continue to focus on hitting singles, doubles, and triples, and an occasional home run, and we also hope to throw in a grand slam from time to time. We hope you'll be enjoying the game with us, and we're working hard to win in all of our industries. I thank you all.
The Research Frontiers Investors conference call has now come to an end. Thank you for joining, and have a pleasant day.
The host has ended this call. Goodbye.