A123 posting losses

[SniperGaulois]

As i understand it , A123 is posting large losses (80mn in the last quarter and an inventory of only 100mn in the bank) because it has made too many factories and too many batteries given the ecar market size, and that Fisker automotive cancelled it's order so they have a million cells in stock that they dont have buyers for??? A123 shares are slipping, and it isnt doing very good business at the moment, is it good or bad news for us?

 

[ohzee]

interesting stuff - well since the tech is old and lithium magnesium seems like the hot new thing id say it's go to be good for us
so we can get our hands on em cheaper.

 

[neptronix]

Too bad they never sold one of the safest cells in existence to the end user.

Back to business 101 ;]

 

[chilledoutuk]

strangely a123 were very stupid in ignoring the hobbyist end user market which is lucrative and requires only little investment and gains there tech a great reputation.

I harvested a123 cells to use in my rc cars many years ago and was blown away by the quality and performance of there m1 cells.

I think the business plan of going after contracts with car makers is a bad idea nissan has already shown they intend to develop and make there own cells Why mostly because this is what they will make money out of in the future and also car makers don't like depending on external companies for some so integral to there products.

We can only hope someone like ford doesn't buy a123 to acquire there technology to use exclusively.

If a123 did however go under there would be a lot of a123 cells floating about which could be good for some of us on here.

 

[The Mighty Volt]

They sound like complete bone heads.

My understanding is that there are millions of cells out there for next to nothing. As lows as $20 a pop.

 

[etard]

The selfish pricks thought they had something so good that the market would wait for them in their own time. Thank goodness Lithium Polymer cells have been improved enough to make these cells obsolete to the RC crowd. They are amazing cells, perfect for electric motorcycle, so when they are finally released to the public for liquidation I will be there to pick up the pieces.

 

[chilledoutuk]

Honestly there were already lipo cells that were much better performing than a123 cells with much better energy density.

I mostly got them for the cycle life but most rc racers don't care about that and lipo would give them an big advantage even back then with the higher energy density
and power output.

I find it funny everyone keeps saying lipos have improved but then end of the day the c rating may have gone up a bit but on most Chinese made packs these are normally vastly exaggerated and considering you cant get kokam cells anymore the only really HQ lipo cells out there are the enerland cells.

The gens ace cells look very nice though hopefully they will make other Chinese cell makers buck up there game as reports of cells puffing still after 30-50 cycles horrifies me tbh.

Although i suspect that people getting puffing are probably mating sub standard packs with chargers that are very inaccurate.

 

[Lemlux]

K2's site reports that they've finally turned profitable in January 27, 2012 news release.

 

[liveforphysics]

All the financials are available on a123s site.

They have always only posted massive losses, not a new thing for them.

They also list the production cost in dollar/wh, and what they sold them for.

IIRC, they sell at something like half the cost of making them. Your tax dollar picks up the rest.

 

[Hillhater]

They also list the production cost in dollar/wh, and what they sold them for.
.

The "production cost" figure could be massaged any which way they want it to look to suit their strategy.
Production rate, direct costs, Development costs, Capital amortization, Loan interest, spoilage costs, etc etc.. are all such huge variables that can be manipulated by creative accounting.

...IIRC, they sell at something like half the cost of making them. Your tax dollar picks up the rest. .

..and that ( together with other Tax off sets) would be a very compelling reason to show a negative margin !

And a company would have to be especially dumb to publicly post its actual production or selling costs ....that is highly sensitive commercial information in any business.