Shekel Brainweigh (ASX:SBW) would have matched last year’s profitability, had the IPO in November not happened.

The Israel-based company used to make super-sensitive weighing machines such as premature baby incubators, but used the IPO money to commercialise ‘product aware’ shelving that knows by weight, exactly what is on it. Even to the point of knowing whether it’s the whitening toothpaste or the regular you’ve just picked up and put back.

The company is chaired by former Australian ambassador to Israel and Liberal Wentworth candidate Dave Sharma.

The company reported an underlying full year profit — the one that doesn’t include one-off IPO expenses of $US950,000, performance shares and option expenses of $US1.1m — of $US1.2m, a fall from the net profit of $1.9m in 2017.

The 2018 net result — the figure that includes all one-off expenses and only-on-paper changes the accountants like to include — was a loss of $US942,000.

Shekel boss Yoram Ben Porat said the result would have been in-line with 2017 had they not incurred those extra costs and increased the R&D budget.

The full year results do not take into account the new shelving product, which they’re yet to start making sales for. An order for 1200 vending machines that use the technology was made in February by the Israeli arm of a Chinese food company.

The business made $US18.7m in revenue in 2018, entirely from the original business, while R&D expenses rose to $US2.5m.

They sold exactly 9,827 precision weighing systems to GE Healthcare, and 35,286 self-checkout units to companies including Toshiba, Fujitsu, and Diebold Nixdorf.

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