{ "docId": "019dd923-622c-750b-8b9a-4b91788fc785", "docSlug": "5fadb686cc03", "documentTitle": "Twist Bioscience (TWST)", "authorId": "58_Scorpion_Capital", "authorName": "Scorpion Capital", "documentKindSlug": "activist-deck", "documentKindLabel": "Activist deck", "sourceTypeSlug": "short_seller", "sourceTypeLabel": "Short seller", "presentationDate": "2022-11-15 00:00:00", "orientation": "landscape", "aspectRatio": 1.2941177, "pageNumber": 186, "pageCount": 236, "prevPage": 185, "nextPage": 187, "slideType": "expose_contradiction", "function": "expose_contradiction", "density": "dense", "nDataPoints": 1, "notes": "The slide uses a Q&A format to validate the thesis that Twist's growth is stalling.", "elementsJson": [ "paragraph", "quote_block" ], "metadataConfidence": 0.95, "imagePath": null, "slideHref": "/slides/019dd923-622c-750b-8b9a-4b91788fc785/186", "deckHref": "/decks/019dd923-622c-750b-8b9a-4b91788fc785", "deckJsonHref": "/decks/019dd923-622c-750b-8b9a-4b91788fc785.json", "deckAnchorHref": "/decks/019dd923-622c-750b-8b9a-4b91788fc785#slide-186", "components": [ { "bbox": null, "kind": "callout", "text": "Twist took “a lot of share in the beginning” but now “much harder to gain traction”; customer acquisition has plateaued in the last year; “mood isn’t so great” inside Twist", "attrs": null, "subkind": null, "toolName": "Visual emphasis", "toolSlug": "visual-emphasis", "confidence": null, "componentId": "019dd953-0932-77cf-bff3-d21f850129a4", "frameworkName": null, "frameworkSlug": null }, { "bbox": { "h": 0.05, "w": 0.9, "x": 0.05, "y": 0.55 }, "kind": "list", "text": "Twist took “a lot of share in the beginning” but now “much harder to gain traction”; customer acquisition has plateaued in the last year; “mood isn’t so great” inside Twist", "attrs": null, "subkind": "bullet", "toolName": null, "toolSlug": null, "confidence": null, "componentId": "2c5cc3b0-8ebc-4f71-a556-34e9dbe1ff07", "frameworkName": null, "frameworkSlug": null }, { "bbox": { "h": 0.15, "w": 0.9, "x": 0.05, "y": 0.08 }, "kind": "paragraph", "text": "Former employees and competitors indicated that Twist’s growth is beginning to hit the wall, as it has saturated its tiny niche of price-sensitive customers willing to trade deep discounts for lower quality, such as academic labs and startups.", "attrs": null, "subkind": "paragraph", "toolName": null, "toolSlug": null, "confidence": null, "componentId": "253139b9-0dd8-4d55-990e-ac269c3164cd", "frameworkName": null, "frameworkSlug": null }, { "bbox": { "h": 0.35, "w": 0.9, "x": 0.05, "y": 0.6 }, "kind": "paragraph", "text": "A: “I think Twist took a lot of share in the beginning because of the fact that the market wasn’t well-supported by IDT or Agilent. So, it’s very easy to gain traction in the beginning. Nowadays, it’s much harder to gain traction...so, it’s much more competitive. There was an exponential curve of customer acquisition that I don’t believe is continuing. if you look at their number of customers and you plot it on a graph, you could probably see a good plateau of NGS-specific customers within the last year.”\nQ: “Are there signs that you see that they’re having growth or saturation challenges in their NGS business?”\nA: “Yes.”\nQ: “What are those signs that you’re seeing?”\nA: “I’ll put it like this: if they were only an NGS company, I would not look favorably in their - ”\nQ: “Well, they basically are because NGS is 60% of their revenue now, and it’s their main growth driver.”\nA: “The first two years I was with Twist, it was like customer acquisition - I got a new customer two, three times a week. And I still have many friends over there, and the mood isn’t so great. –Former employee now at a key competitor", "attrs": null, "subkind": "paragraph", "toolName": null, "toolSlug": null, "confidence": null, "componentId": "a6b7fdde-74a9-4fc9-a22b-7ea64617a310", "frameworkName": null, "frameworkSlug": null }, { "bbox": { "h": 0.25, "w": 0.9, "x": 0.05, "y": 0.23 }, "kind": "paragraph", "text": "We spoke with an ex-Twist employee now at its key competitor – we shield the company’s name to protect his identity - which provides him with a unique vantage point. He indicated that Twist took “a lot of share in the beginning” but is now struggling to find growth: “Nowadays it’s much harder to gain traction...it’s much more competitive”: a “plateau of NGS-specific customers within the last year”; “I still have many friends there, and the mood isn’t so great”; “there was an exponential curve of customer acquisition that I don’t believe is continuing.”", "attrs": null, "subkind": "paragraph", "toolName": null, "toolSlug": null, "confidence": null, "componentId": "f8dda347-801d-4d39-8678-b9b0fb8bc382", "frameworkName": null, "frameworkSlug": null }, { "bbox": null, "kind": "quote", "text": "“I think Twist took a lot of share in the beginning because of the fact that the market wasn't well-supported by IDT or Agilent. So, it's very easy to gain traction in the beginning. Nowadays, it's much harder to gain traction...so, it's much more competitive. There was an exponential curve of customer acquisition that I don't believe is continuing. if you look at their number of customers and you plot it on a graph, you could probably see a good plateau of NGS-specific customers within the last year.” — Former employee now at a key competitor", "attrs": null, "subkind": null, "toolName": "Authority citation", "toolSlug": "authority-citation", "confidence": null, "componentId": "019dd953-0932-77cf-bff3-d47f9f20a55f", "frameworkName": null, "frameworkSlug": null }, { "bbox": { "h": 0.02, "w": 0.3, "x": 0.05, "y": 0.96 }, "kind": "source-note", "text": "Source: Scorpion Capital consultation calls with experts", "attrs": null, "subkind": null, "toolName": null, "toolSlug": null, "confidence": null, "componentId": "75cc6e8e-87f4-4084-b3a1-a52dec3a879c", "frameworkName": null, "frameworkSlug": null } ], "metrics": [], "tools": [], "frameworks": [ { "name": "antagonist-introduction", "slug": null, "matchId": "f979482e-3d04-4df6-9c15-b4da2e92d90e", "evidence": "The slide frames the company's growth narrative as a failure by citing an anonymous former employee.", "confidence": 0.8 } ], "arcBeats": [], "loops": [], "imagePathAlt": null, "thumbSrc": null, "thumbSrcAlt": null, "locked": true }