IdaTech plc a developer and manufacturer of PEM fuel cell products for critical power markets, announced its Preliminary Results for the 12 months ended 31 December 2010. Revenue for 2010 was $4.5 million, of which $4.0 million was from the sale of products. In 2009 revenue was $6.6 million in total, $4.5 million from product sales and US$ 2.1 million relating to projects.
During 2010, IdaTech sold over 350 systems, 280 of which were sold at a positive gross contribution margin (2009 445 and 9 units respectively). IdaTech’s next generation systems, the ElectraGen™ H2 and the ElectraGen™ ME, accounted for 280 of the 2010 unit sales. The remainder of the sales consisted of now discontinued, earlier generations of its products.
A significant development during the year as a result of these decisions was the significant improvement in the gross loss of $1.8 million which fell to $3.2 million from $ 5.0 million in 2009. This was despite the large fall in revenue from projects which typically have a much higher gross margin than product sales. Excluding the gross margin from projects, the gross loss from products improved from $6.2 million to $3.2 million.
In total, operating expenses fell by $8.0 million to 20.5 million compared with 2009. Research and development costs in the year were $11.5 million (2009 $17.7 million). Allowing for the $4.5 million impact in 2009 of the write off of IP relating to the IdaTech’s 250W product, recurring expenses fell by $1.7 million year on year due to the refocusing of the development team solely on the ElectraGenTM ME product range.
Sales, general and administrative expenses were also lower at $9.0 million (2008 $10.8 million). Overall administrative expenses fell by $1.6 million versus 2009 mainly due to reduced share based payment charges in relation to the Groups employee equity plans and reduced legal and professional fees. Sales related expenses also fell $0.2 million compared with the prior year despite the addition of extra sales resources in Asia Pacific due to lower travel, trade shows and advertising expenditures.
EBITDA(earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) loss decreased significantly by $5.3 million to $20.0 million (2009 $25.3 million) as a result of the lower gross margin loss of $1.8 million and lower operating overheads of $3.5 million (excluding of the write off of IP relating to the IdaTech’s 250W product in 2009). There was also a material decrease in the operating loss for 2010 compared with 2009 of $9.8 million, falling from $33.5 million in 2009 to $23.7 million as explained above.
