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Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Axion's progress

AXPW.ob issued their quarterly report this morning. The only thing I was looking for was progress with their respective developments. (The CEO was kinda fluffy with his endorsement of "triple digit growth" prospects this year. Something I do not care to see from a CEO, but the progress does speaks for itself.)

  • Our automated robotic line was delivered, has been assembled, aligned and each individual station has been commissioned. We are now utilizing the line to manufacture product. We have run product from end to end as we work on improving dwell times to achieve the design number of seconds allocated for each station.
  • To reduce our burn rate as we move forward with the commercialization of our PbC® products, we announced on March 8, 2011 that we received a series of orders for flooded lead-acid batteries. Production and shipment of these batteries began in the first quarter of 2011, and has continued to ramp up and will impact our revenue and margins in the second quarter of 2011. As previously disclosed, our production to fulfill these orders will generate a minimum of $3.5 million in new revenue, with a potential maximum of $8 million in new revenue in 2011. The maximum number is based on the purchaser's forecast, which was projected from their historical data.
  • Our work continues with Norfolk Southern (NS) on the hybrid locomotive and we have received a purchase order from NS for PbC batteries in amounts sufficient to enable NS to platform-test our product in large string configurations. At the same time, under a service contract with NS, we are performing duplicate hybrid locomotive battery testing of our PbC product, and our battery management system, at our New Castle facilities.
  • Work also continues on our PbC solution for the emerging hybrid vehicle market. Various forms of testing continue with European OEMs. In the United States we recently received notification from the Department of Energy that our proposal, under the Vehicles Technology Program DE-FOA-0000239, had passed the first round of criteria testing and had advanced to the final round of review. Our proposal was jointly submitted with a 'top three' US vehicle manufacturer and the grant, if awarded, will extend for a three-year period. Preliminary correspondence indicates a decision on awards will be made by July 1, 2011.
  • We have also finished assembling our onsite PowerCube™ and have begun testing on the first of the four 160 battery strings contained in that cube. Our proprietary battery management system is also undergoing full testing in that first configuration. The onsite PowerCube will allow us to test our product in numerous grid applications including backup power, power quality, load leveling and potential arbitrage utilization." 
You can compare for yourself from the previous update. A key date to remember is July 1, 2011. The grant will be interesting.  Right now, AXPW has about enough cash to last a 1-2 years without raising additional funds. The grant may prolong that need. If revenue from the PbC come online during that time, may prevent the need for one.

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