Battery Power, Products & Technology Magazine -- eNewsletter

MicroSun Technologies Achieves $500/kWh in High Power Applications
MicroSun Technologies, a manufacturer of high performance lithium ion battery packs and smart charging devices, has successfully achieved the $500/kWh goal for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) applications and intends to further expand its presence in emerging electric vehicle (EV) applications.

Utilizing innovative design engineering with advanced manufacturing capabilities, MicroSun produced a cost-effective, high power battery system that addresses thermal safety, individual cell balancing and high current output. This battery system was successfully test-driven and meets the goal of $500/kWh. Innovative power solutions drive MicroSun’s sales growth and expansion of its current facility. Near term plans include additional expansions to specifically address growing demand for military and PHEV applications.

Evergreen Solar Panels to Power Electric Vehicle Recharging Station in Frankfurt, Germany
Evergreen Solar, Inc., a manufacturer of solar power products, has unveiled that its panels are being used to provide the electricity for a new electric vehicle battery recharging station in a high-traffic area in Frankfurt, Germany. The solar fuel station provides free battery charging for small-scale electric vehicles including Velotaxis, Segways, electric bikes and scooters.

The station contains six charging ports all of which receive their power from the Evergreen Solar panels located on the building's roof. The installation is located in a major shopping district allowing people to power their vehicles while they shop. On a hot sunny, summer day the station will produce approximately 21 kWh of electricity and enough annually to power 115,000 kilometers of travel for the average e- scooter. The cost of the installation was $86,000 and was shared by the project's partners Ralos GmbH, Mainova AG, traffiQ GmbH, Umweltforum Rhein Main e.V., Frankfurter Sparkasse, Velotaxi M. Graf, Rossel-Display GmbH & Co. KG and the Goethe Gymnasium, a high school in Frankfurt.

"This new solar fuel station will serve as a model for the transportation industry and is a major step forward in helping promote environmentally-friendly transportation," said Peter Rusch, Evergreen Solar's director of marketing and sales for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. "As a company that produces solar panels delivering the most electricity with the smallest carbon footprint, we feel a project like this one is very much in line with our brand and our overall mission."

In addition to sales of batteries for motive power applications, Master Battery will provide battery service and preventative maintenance programs for its motive power customers.In the materials handling industry, the batteries are used to power lift trucks, various types of pallet trucks and stackers, order pickers, reach trucks and mobile utility work platforms. These quiet, powerful, zero-emission vehicles are an integral part of modern materials handling. Other applications for the batteries are airport ground-support equipment, passenger shuttles, delivery vehicles, wheelchairs and floor-scrubbing equipment.

“Exide has a strong track record in serving the specific needs of our customer base,” said John Bondy, vice president of Motive Power Sales for Exide Technologies. “As Master Battery works to aggressively expand its industrial offerings, Exide will continue to build upon this relationship, maintaining our focus on making our new customer more competitive and more successful.”

Ultralife Corp. Reports First Quarter Results
Ultralife Corp. has reported revenue of $39.8 million for its first quarter ended March 29, 2009, a decrease of $9.8 million, or 20 percent, from the $49.6 million in revenue reported for the comparable quarter of 2008. The company reported an operating loss of $2.3 million in the first quarter of 2009, compared with operating income of $2.4 million in the same period a year ago. The $9.8 million decrease in revenue resulted primarily from lower shipments of advanced communications systems, as orders received in the latter part of 2007 were fulfilled during 2008. Partially offsetting this was a near doubling of rechargeable product revenue as demand for rechargeable batteries and chargers rose.

“Our fiscal year 2009 has started more slowly than we had planned,” said John D. Kavazanjian, president and CEO. “First, the release of government/defense orders is taking longer than anticipated. Although funding for the related programs is in place, there have been government delays in finalizing the proper contract vehicles. However, in order to be responsive to anticipated customer needs, our inventory levels rose during the quarter to put us in a delivery-ready mode. Second, severe price competition by component suppliers has been putting pressure on the margins in our standby power business. To combat these short-term pricing dynamics, we are intensifying our efforts to market our system solutions, which bundle services and products, to customers and prospects. We believe that our value-added solutions approach, combined with our engineering and services capabilities and growing national footprint, creates a compelling advantage that will support long-term growth in the standby power market.”

Kavazanjian added, “Although we still expect orders for our advanced communications systems and rechargeable batteries and charging systems to be released against government/defense programs in 2009, our assumption is that administrative delays will cause implementation of these programs to be one quarter later than previously anticipated. In other areas of our business, our outlook for growth remains unchanged.”

Solicore Accelerates Battery Production Scale-Up
Solicore, Inc., a provider in embedded power solutions for RFID applications, powered cards and micro medical devices, has produced over 1,000,000 batteries in the first quarter of 2009 to meet the ever expanding market demands for thin film lithium polymer batteries. Solicore produces batteries on its state-of-the-art high speed manufacturing line, which has recently completed scale-up activity and is now capable of producing in excess of two million units per month, the equivalent of approximately two batteries every three seconds.

“We’ve cut down the time it takes to switch between battery sizes on the high speed manufacturing line; what once took days, now takes only a matter of hours and consistently produces premium product from the line. This allows for greater flexibility to expand capacity as demand continues to increase across all battery sizes,” says Dan Tillwick, chief operating officer for Solicore. “Our year-to-date on-time delivery is over 98 percent, reflecting a tremendous team effort and successful upgrades to our high speed manufacturing line.”