Cell Impact’s efforts to reach out with its offering of green, scalable and cost-effective flow plate production and technology to manufacturers of fuel cells for hydrogen are starting to pay off. The first quarter of 2023 was our most intensive quarter yet with a large number of international visitors. Some of these visits aim to take things to the next level, from initial testing activities to full-scale prototype and series production. In light of this acceleration in activity and demand for Cell Impact’s products and services, we hope to gain a number of new customers in 2023.
The first quarter of the year was a strong quarter characterized mainly by sales of flow plates and development projects. Revenues amounted to SEK 29.7 million (21.7), which corresponds to growth of 36.9 percent. The company’s operating loss was –29.9 MSEK (–23.9) after planned investments in the organization and the company’s production capacity to position Cell Impact as an important player in the expanding global hydrogen market.
Around the world, hydrogen is considered to be a major part of the solution to the climate crisis. Indeed, this idea is supported by a report published in January 2023 by the International Energy Agency (IAE) and the European Patents Office (EPO) that showed that almost 80 percent of patents involving hydrogen that were registered in 2020 were related to climate issues.
When the report was released, EPO chairman António Campinos commented:
“Harnessing the potential of hydrogen is a key part of Europe’s strategy to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. But if hydrogen is to play a major role in reducing CO2 emissions, innovation is urgently needed across a range of technologies.”
This is why I find it so incredibly rewarding to work in a company at the forefront of a number of industry-first processes for manufacturing flow plates – a key component in electrolyzers and fuel cells – in a cost-efficient way. Cell Impact is an enabler of large-scale production of green hydrogen through electrolysis and electrification using fuel cells that have a significant positive impact on climate change.
One limiting factor for electrolysis is said to be a lack of clean water. This is why it was so positive to learn that during the quarter, researchers from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia succeeded in extracting hydrogen by splitting seawater. This is a significant advance. It means there is great potential to reduce costs since salt water is the most abundant type of water and desalination will no longer be necessary when producing hydrogen.
For Cell Impact’s part, work is continuing in Phase II where we are developing production and innovative processes to lower the unit cost of flow plates while maintaining a focus on profitability. Our unique forming technology, Cell Impact Forming™, enables flow plate manufacturing faster, cheaper and with less climate impact than traditional production methods.
Not only that, the forming machinery is smaller, making it possible to install it without a major construction project directly on an industrial floor, significantly faster and more easily than the alternatives. We can see that this simplicity and short lead time for producing equipment is starting to play an increasingly important role in our continued business development.
Interest in Cell Impact’s technology is growing against the backdrop of production and demonstration line installations in the US and Japan.
Interest in Cell Impact’s technology is growing following installations of production lines for demonstrations in the US and Japan. During the quarter, a demonstration line was installed at vehicle component manufacturer F.C.C Co. in Hamamatsu, Japan and we welcomed a number of leading Japanese and international fuel cell manufacturers to the demo facility during the quarter.
We’re seeing increased interest in terms of the number of international companies visiting our factory in Karlskoga. The level of activity increased during the quarter and we hosted around 10 different companies. From what I’ve seen, visitors have been pleasantly surprised by how far we’ve advanced, by our Phase II plan for the future and by how relatively easily and quickly we can scale up production.
Today, in Karlskoga, we have built up world-leading production capacity to manufacture customized bipolar flow plates. We have scaled up both our ambitions and actions, putting Cell Impact at the forefront of the industry.
One thing that we’ve noticed is that fuel cell and electrolyzer manufacturers are concerned about local production as well as delivery of critical components. With Cell Impact’s scalable production methods, we are well positioned to support customers with capacity should protectionist strategies require localized production.
Cell Impact is working every day to achieve further commercial success and to be part of the solution to the climate crisis. We’re making progress in our operations, order levels are high and we are running a number of exciting development projects with customers and prospects to lay the foundation for continued growth.
Pär Teike, President & CEO
Karlskoga, May 2023
