GD Reddit Mentions | ChartExchange

It is obvious why the emphasis has switched to industrial deals, not just because of delays in the automotive deals but because of our need to show strength in other markets to be able to win long term automotive contracts. I expect that we are currently in the customer evaluation phases of several deals with engineers on site helping with test and integration. It does seem to be taking much longer than anyone expected and they probably should have put emphasis on industrial much earlier. The notion that they are nervous about these deals simply arises from what they have said. It is not a big deal but they have indicated nervousness in the sense that it is a bit of a gamble and that they have limited capital as SS said in the 2025 Q1 EC:
“But we are getting closer to the point for the right customer, for the right volume, that it is time for us to push our chips in and actually take a risk for the right customer with the right volume. And we’re getting closer to that. And again, you want not just one customer, you want multiple of them. So you have to reserve your capital based on who’s the one that you want to make a bet behind.”
They lost the automotive Daimler Movia deal as described by SS in the 2024 Q2 EC:
“We were told that our sensor and software proposal was the most mature and top offering. Our manufacturing strategy was the highest level of maturity and went through their qualification, reported to us as in the top tenth percentile of their suppliers. Our commercial proposal was also accepted. Their preference was for a partner with a more diversified product and revenue portfolio.”
AV described this as a lower volume deal but it wasn’t particularly as u/mvis_thma pointed out, it could have been 400,000 Movia sensors, based around the numbers from the long range lidar contract. This could have been a significant win that could have really bumped our share price, with the assumption, although false, that more was to follow. At least then dilution could have occurred at a much more healthy level.
The automotive deals that we lost I am inferring from SS in the 2025 Q1 EC:
“In previous years, we focused on winning programs targeted for production with several years of customization in play. These deals could be described as the ones our competitors signed. In each agreement, the challenge we faced was not our technology or capability, rather than the state of our balance sheet would always cause OEMs to pause.”
I suspect that these weren’t ultimately high volume but enough for us to bid for them. Again it highlights the same problem that we were not trusted to be around long enough to be awarded these multi-year automotive deals.
The idea that we have the best technology therefore our problem must be down to sales is clearly an over simplification. I still believe it comes down to our business model.
If we can get multiple, high volume, good margin, industrial deals, then that will help to make us look like a company that is going to stick around. Add some decent partnerships from defence, then things will really be looking up. If the automotive RFQs are now higher quality, as GD has stated, and put us in a dominant position, then perhaps this horror show finally comes together.