In a detailed interview with Tracy Weslosky, Greg Fenton, CEO and Director of Zentek Ltd. (NASDAQ: ZTEK | TSXV: ZEN), shared insights into the company’s strategic progress and emerging opportunities, particularly emphasizing its work with aptamer technology. With an exclusive global license for innovative Aptamer-based platform technology developed by McMaster University, Zentek is pioneering advances in both diagnostic and therapeutic applications, underscoring its dedication to healthcare innovation. The company has made notable breakthroughs in COVID-19 therapeutics with its C19HBA aptamer, showing significant promise in preclinical trials by outperforming leading monoclonal antibodies. This success has paved the way for Phase 1 clinical trials for COVID-19 and exploration into other areas such as oncology, immunology, and neurology.

Fenton highlighted the positive reception from major pharmaceutical companies, reflecting a broad industry interest in Zentek’s aptamer technology. Additionally, Zentek’s ZenGUARD™ technology platform, known for its 99-percent anti-microbial activity, has been instrumental in enhancing the bacterial and viral filtration efficiency of surgical masks and HVAC systems. A recent study on ZenGUARD™ Enhanced Air Filters revealed its potential to offer significant energy, emission, and cost savings for commercial buildings, showcasing a scalable solution for improving indoor air quality and addressing climate change.

Throughout the conversation, Fenton articulated Zentek’s ambitious plans for partnerships and expansion, leveraging the favorable market conditions to boost the company’s visibility and impact. His vision for Zentek includes strategic partnerships, leveraging its proprietary technology, and a commitment to revolutionizing the approach to managing infectious diseases and enhancing environmental sustainability.

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About Zentek Ltd.

Zentek is an ISO 13485:2016 certified intellectual property technology company focused on the research, development and commercialization of novel products seeking to give the Company’s commercial partners a competitive advantage by making their products better, safer, and greener.

Zentek’s patented technology platform ZenGUARD™, is shown to have 99-per-cent anti-microbial activity and to significantly increase the bacterial and viral filtration efficiency of both surgical masks and HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) systems. Zentek’s ZenGUARD™ production facility is located in Guelph, Ontario.

Zentek, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Triera Biosciences Ltd., has a global exclusive license to the Aptamer-based platform technology developed by McMaster University, which is being jointly developed by Zentek and McMaster for both the diagnostic and therapeutic markets.

The Company is not making any express or implied claims that its aptamer technology has the ability to eliminate, cure or contain COVID-19 (or the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus) at this time.

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This interview, which was produced by InvestorNews Inc. (“InvestorNews”), does not contain, nor does it purport to contain, a summary of all material information concerning the Company, including important disclosure and risk factors associated with the Company, its business and an investment in its securities. InvestorNews offers no representations or warranties that any of the information contained in this interview is accurate or complete.

This interview and any transcriptions or reproductions thereof (collectively, this “presentation”) does not constitute, or form part of, any offer or invitation to sell or issue, or any solicitation of any offer to subscribe for or purchase any securities in the Company. The information in this presentation is provided for informational purposes only and may be subject to updating, completion or revision, and except as may be required by applicable securities laws, the Company disclaims any intent or obligation to update any information herein. This presentation may contain “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking statements are based on the opinions and assumptions of the management of the Company as of the date made. They are inherently susceptible to uncertainty and other factors that could cause actual events/results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements. Additional risks and uncertainties, including those that the Company does not know about now or that it currently deems immaterial, may also adversely affect the Company’s business or any investment therein.

Any projections given are principally intended for use as objectives and are not intended, and should not be taken, as assurances that the projected results will be obtained by the Company. The assumptions used may not prove to be accurate and a potential decline in the Company’s financial condition or results of operations may negatively impact the value of its securities. This presentation should not be considered as the giving of investment advice by the Company or any of its directors, officers, agents, employees or advisors. Each person to whom this presentation is made available must make its own independent assessment of the Company after making such investigations and taking such advice as may be deemed necessary. Prospective investors are urged to review the Company’s profile on SedarPlus.ca and to carry out independent investigations in order to determine their interest in investing in the Company.

At the start of the year, I was asked to pick a name that I thought could be the “stock to watch in 2022”. Naturally the tendency is to step a little further out the risk curve because where’s the fun in picking something like Enbridge, Inc. (TSX: ENB | NYSE: ENB) and being up 15% year-to-date plus dividend when you could be up 130% over that same time period with a stock like Ensign Energy Services, Inc. (TSX: ESI). In reality, I would have been a hero if I had picked either of those in light of what the majority of the market has done since the start of 2022. However, I went down the technology route (or should I say rout) and the name I picked has been swept lower in a market beating up anything resembling tech. On top of that, the company I selected was also the focus of a short report, although that appears to have been addressed in March and seems to be a non-issue. But technology stocks are still seeing some pretty unpleasant days here and there, and the pain may not be over yet.

Nevertheless, until the year is over, I still have time to be vindicated with my 2022 pick – Zentek Ltd. (NASDAQ: ZTEK | TSXV: ZEN), which is certainly doing better than Shopify, Inc. (TSX: SHOP | NYSE: SHOP) but sadly that’s not setting the bar too high. Reader’s will recall that Zentek is an IP development and commercialization company focused on next-gen healthcare solutions in the areas of prevention, detection, and treatment. Zentek is currently focused on commercializing ZenGUARD™, a patent-pending coating shown to have 99% antimicrobial activity, including against COVID-19, and the potential to use similar compounds as products against infectious diseases.

The focus on ZenGUARD™ is paying off with an announcement last week of the sales and distribution of ZenGUARD™ Masks through Mark’s, a member of the Canadian Tire Family of Companies. Mark’s, which operates over 380 stores across Canada, has placed an initial order for ZenGUARD™ coated masks to be sold at select stores and online. Mark’s VP Iain Summers is quoted as saying “We are relentlessly focused on innovative new technologies and products that help keep Canadians safe and comfortable. Zentek, and their ZenGUARD™ masks are a great made-in-Canada innovation using a technology that, when applied to essential masks, provides ultimate protection, while maintaining comfort and breathability. It’s the right fit for our customers.” This news helped Zentek stock rally 14% on the day.

It was the progress the Company was making with ZenGUARD™ and their other unique IP opportunities that led to Zentek being my stock to watch. Other technologies under development include an icephobic coating that can potentially be used to improve aircraft and drone safety and sustainability. The Company anticipates applications for aircraft, wind turbines, ocean vessels, and building structures to increase safety and efficiency outcomes in ice-forming weather conditions. The Company recently reported excellent results in three rounds of testing of its icephobic coating, including laboratory tests, real-world flights and applications related to drone operations in adverse weather. Next steps include testing its coating for sand and rain erosion, and other tests are being planned that will evaluate the coating as part of a hybrid ice protection system, where the icephobic properties are combined with a heated de-icing system with the aim to improve efficiency of current ice protection methods used in general and commercial aviation.

In April, Zentek provided an update on a previously awarded R&D test contract through the Innovation Solutions Canada (ISC) Testing Stream to test ZENGuard™ coated HVAC filters with interest from 3 different units within the National Research Council of Canada. After completion of Phase 1 testing where its ZenGUARD™ coating was successful in reducing airborne organisms from passing through coated filter material while not inhibiting air flow, it will now proceed to Phase 2 testing within its ISC Testing Stream contract. Phase 2 testing in a real-world classroom environment is aimed to generate additional safety and efficacy data. The importance of indoor air quality and improving health is a top priority for numerous organizations globally, including the Canadian and U.S. governments, and could be an important commercialization milestone for Zentek in this critical area.

Sure all these initiatives were already on the go at the start of the year, but in my opinion, the Company is making great strides in pushing these projects to the revenue generation stage. In fact, ZenGAURD™ actually started generating revenue in the final quarter of 2021. Additionally, Zentek raised C$33 million in January and have a quarterly cash burn rate of roughly C$2-C$2.5 million per quarter (and no debt), so they should be fine for available capital. With a market cap of roughly C$247 million there are plenty of creative and unique opportunities being developed to propel this Company into the future and vindicate my selection.

Zentek Ltd. (TSXV: ZEN) (formerly ZEN Graphene Solutions Ltd.) is a trail blazing company in the world of  nanotechnology and graphene, particularly in the healthcare sector. That is because not only does it make its own graphene but Zen has also partnered with other companies to expand the uses of graphene in areas such as (graphene coated) masks clothing, and other PPE, as well as COVID-19 rapid saliva tests, graphene colloidal antiviral/bacterial/fungal detection, and, hopefully, improved air purifiers, and air conditioning systems using graphene filtration.

Zentek summarizes this by saying that “Nanotechnology and graphene have the potential to protect against pathogens, detect and treat disease, clean our water, make building materials stronger and produce cleaner energy. With almost limitless potential to improve people’s lives, we are uniquely positioned to create significant value through our next-generation healthcare solutions and beyond.​”

Zentek is currently focusing on commercializing into health care prevention, detection, and treatment

Source: Zentek Company presentation

Zentek’s vision is for a healthier and safer world through nanotechnology, and its mission is to develop innovative nanotechnologies, with their partners, that improve people’s lives. What a great basis to grow a company from.

Zentek’s stock price has risen 281% over the past year after more than quadrupling the year before. From the March 1, 2020 low of C$0.30 the stock has risen a whopping 20.7x, now sitting at C$6.20. Tesla and some junior lithium stocks are the only stocks I know that have achieved a 20x return in the past 2 years. This puts Zentek up there with the most elite performers on the stock market in recent times.

What’s next for Zentek

• A Nasdaq listing – On October 13, 2021, Zentek (then ZEN Graphene Solutions) announced that it has submitted an application to list its common stock on The Nasdaq Capital Market^®  (“Nasdaq”) and that it has retained Donohoe Advisory Associates, LLC, to assist with the listing process. That process is ongoing with no listing date yet announced.
• ZENGuard™ international patent application to complete soon. ZENGuard^TM is a graphene-silver ‘coating’ with 99% antimicrobial activity, including against COVID-19. Zentek is commercializing ZENGuard^TM with mask manufacturer, Trebor Rx, to produce masks, filters and gloves. ZENGuard^TM is Health Canada approved. Zentek’s coating can also be used on all types of personal protective equipment including masks, gloves, clothes, and shields to reduce the spread of pathogens including COVID-19. Similar products can be used in air purification systems. There is also the potential (if approved) to use similar compounds as pharmaceutical products against infectious diseases.
• Zentek’s Pathogen Detection Technology (aptamer-enabled) initially for COVID-19 to be launched by Q1, 2022. Zentek has the worldwide exclusive rights to commercialize a rapid, saliva-based COVID-19 antigen testing technology. The key differentiating factor here is that the test can detect much lower quantities of virus compared to other tests, thereby being able to potentially detect low viral loads at the early stages of infection when the patient may be asymptomatic. The test is exceptionally accurate (similar to current PCR tests), saliva-based, affordable, scalable and provides results in under 10 minutes. The test still requires final Health Canada and FDA approval. Zentek recently announced the development of an improved aptamer with a higher binding affinity for the COVID-19 Delta variant as well as reduced result production time of the aptamer-based sensor from 18 hours to 30 minutes with more consistent results. Zentek also announced this month that it “has been selected as one of three technologies for phase 1 of the Innovation Solutions Canada (ISC) challenge to develop a portable detection device for SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater. ZEN has received a $148,000 award from ISC to develop its first prototype.”

Zentek CEO, Greg Fenton, recently stated: “In collaboration with our partners, including Dr. Li and his entire McMaster team, we have made tremendous progress advancing our aptamer-based rapid detection platform toward commercialization. A key aspect of the technology is its adaptability through the production of new aptamers to detect different pathogens leveraging the existing platform – and the process of building out this aptamer and disease-detection library is well underway with our colleagues at McMaster.”

ZENGuard™ has enormous potential to scale up from current capacity of coatings for 32 million masks per month to a potential ~800 million masks per month by Q1, 2022

Source: Zentek Company presentation

Closing remarks

Zentek has come a long way in the past 2 years with enormous technological progress in its graphene based nanotechnology products with a renewed health focus to prevent, detect, and, hopefully, soon treat pathogens, including COVID-19. This has been achieved via a number of collaborations, partnerships, patents, and approval by regulatory bodies.

The result of all these efforts should now start to show in 2022 as Zentek’s commercial rollout of its innovative nanotech graphene products gains speed, led by its revolutionary ZENGuard™ coating and the company’s rapidly advancing Pathogen Detection Technology collaboration.

Zentek trades on a market cap of C$551 million and continues to outperform the market.

Disclosure: The author is long ZEN Graphene Solutions (TSXV: ZEN).