Ann: Results of Meeting, page-2

Hi All

The AGM was straight down to business without any fanfare.  The main speakers were MD Bruce Lane and CTO Sean Moore.  I noted that a document was made available for attendees showing all the proxy voting.  Post the voting and passing of all resolutions I asked the following questions and here is my interpretation of the answers from my hastily scribbled down notes:

Government Funding:
I asked them directly about whether they were going to apply for funding from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA).  The answers were given by Bruce  He said basically that yes it is being considered and that there will be a role within the relisted company (Protean Wave Energy Limited: POW) for someone to work on submitting applications for funding from government and private sources.  I thought the answers were somewhat vague on ARENA and they did say that ARENA had been inundated with applications since the change to Malcolm Turnbull, that it had a portfolio approach, etc etc.  It appeared to me from their answers that they didn't think that ARENA was at this time particularly interested in funding the Protean WEC.  When I mentioned that from my reading of ARENA's funding guidelines the Protean WEC clearly fits both the R&D and Piloting early commercialisation funding criteria they agreed and said that their funding application would be enhanced by the early operational data that they are currently obtaining.  Bruce also mentioned that they were aware of the Federal Governments Accelerating Commercialization programme and that this is also a viable option for the company.  They are also eligible R&D tax rebates.  So the upshot was that government and private sector funding applications will be someones responsibility within the relisted company.  IMO this is a current weakness in the company and I believe that Bruce and Brendan need to get busy on this now and get these applications in!

Early Commercialization
This is a strength area.  It appears that they have good knowledge and connections with the Maldives, and advised that the islands have a population of about 400,000 inhabitants and they and their governments are keen for wave energy solutions to costly and environmentally unfriendly diesel power generation. They are confident that they will be operating on the Maldives within two years and are already in talks with two potential paying customers.  They are also of the belief that the $9 billion wave energy market for island communities is a very conservative estimate and that the market is actually much bigger than this! Sean advised that sea water ice (for the fishing industry) is also one of the early commercialisation opportunities along with power and desalinated water.  They believe that California's water crisis and legislated commitment for renewable energy targets present clear opportunities for early commercialisation for the company, hence the MOU with Cal poly.

Desalination
As promised I asked how the desalination process works and the cost metrics.  Sean answered and explained that there are two methods that can be used with the Protean WEC.  The first method is bolt a desalination device directly into the WEC buoys.  The compressed air pipes are already food grade pipes so the desalinated water is just simply pumped to tanks on the shore.  The second process is using the generated compressed air to drive a turbine on shore which pumps the sea water through the salt barriers within the desalination equipment.  Sean advised that money could be made with desalination particularly in up scaling.  There could be a serious income if an operation could be developed the size of one of Perth's new desalination plants.  This is a strength area.

My overall impression was that this is an ethical, open and committed company that is quietly achieving significant milestones along the pathway to commercializing their scalable wave energy technologies.  The market is there and all going well with the technology this company has an enormous opportunity to be a first mover with flexible scalable wave energy devices.  

All that is needed in my opinion is a more assertive approach to obtaining the significant government that is there for this project.

All IMO.

Best wishes to all holders.

Regards,

Chilloutman