fund raising again, page-6

And thats a prudent way to look at it.

The company may be reducing the cost of components and the unit price but their business costs are increasing or at least not being reduced enough to be supported by their volume of sales.

So the reality of the siutation is that we can only hope they have got the business size right with regards to delivering on what they need to whislt being as lean as possible

I know fuelcell feels they could trim more, but time will tell the whole tale on that front. You need to attract quality people, keep quality people and motivate quality people. Everyone will see the value of that differently based on the players.

hat business cost to BlueGens is effectively a fixed number on each unit and contributes to the COG so when not being passed on to consumers just results in more unsustainable pain for the business

I hope they can continue to reduce the cost of materials and equipment etc as much as possible and pass on unit price savings to customers in the hope of taking advantage of subsidies in the market that are supporting initial roll out of SOFC mCHPs.

With some significant volume I am encouraged that whilst the subsidies are still kicking in then the dollars will quickly replenish their cash sheet and the COGS savings from higher volume output will allow them to prepare the business to stand on its own two feet when the subisdies cease.

CFUs ability to get themselves into a sustainable position now whilst other manufactuirers are still in the early phases of field trials and unable to so easily use the subsidies means that they could be far more challanged in commercialising their tech in the future at an affordable price.

Some of CFU's competitors are exstablished companies with revenue from other business operations so not such a concern for them....but for others trying to commercialise their products they could face perhaps a tougher environment with less subsidies. However they are probably timing their product to market better with regards to a more mature industry ready for their roll out.

So CFU will continue to need to raise funds to cover business costs for a few years yet. Several years ago they were talking about needing 1200-1500 sales a year to cover cash burn. Its not really a big figure...but is a long way from where they are.

But I remain optimistic that a medium scale VPP project or a Bruns or Ideal fully integrated order may fall in our lap in the next 12 months. When that comes I will be looking closely at developments with a serious thought of investing a hell of a lot...but have loads of work before then.

They still after all these years have the best electrical effeciency and have IMO picked the right scale of unit for their target market. Nobody else has as many commercial SOFC mCHPs in the field as CFU so if you believe that SOFC mCHPs are going to take over from sterling engine mCHPs PEM fuel cells etc and see them having a place in VPPs supporting the power fluctuations from solar etc....well...

For the time being provided there upcoming CR is sound at this level I am likely to take a bit more of a punt and max out my subscription to shares.

In the meantime you never know, E.On could want to pick up and run from their aborted 2012 exclusivity deal or become an acquisition target