ACTA.L Regulatory News (ACTA)

22 Jan 2009 07:00



22 January 2009  

Acta S.p.A. ("Acta" or the "Company")

Trading Update

Acta, the catalyst technology development company, issues the following trading update today for the year to 31 December 2008. The preliminary results are expected to be announced on Thursday 26 March 2009. 

Commercial and Technical Review

On 7 November 2008 Acta announced that the development contract with a major Asian manufacturer and Sumitomo Corporation had been extended into the second stage of the programme. This programme is continuing to progress well and the technical objectives are expected to be met on time and in full at the end of February.

Acta will again be participating at the Fuel Cell Expo, which is the world's largest trade fair for fuel cell and related technologies and will be held in Tokyo from 25 to 27 February. Acta will present its innovative noble metal-free water electrolyser demonstration unit, which produces high pressure hydrogen from intermittent renewable energy sources without the loss of energy typically incurred by compression. The hydrogen may then be burnt as a fuel or in an internal combustion engine, or re-converted to electricity through a fuel cell when required to meet grid demand. The Board believes that there are widespread applications for this system in industrial hydrogen production, and that it offers a solution to the renewable energy industry's key challenge of efficiently storing energy from intermittent power sources.

The Company will also be presenting the world's first prototype direct ethanol 100W fuel cell generator at the Fuel Cell Expo in Tokyo. The generator was completed in 2008 through the €2.1 million FIT grant project, and was recently demonstrated successfully to the grant approval authorities.

Acta's innovative catalyst for high-power zinc-air battery applications has performed well under test, and is now being evaluated by key global manufacturers in the sector. Acta's other industrial catalyst applications are also developing well, including ammonia waste treatment, which has continued to make technical progress in collaboration with a major US manufacturer.

Financial Review

2008 has been a year of progress across many of Acta's applications. As a result revenues for the year are slightly ahead of those achieved in 2007. At the same time Acta announced at its interim results in September that the business continues to focus on near-term revenue opportunities while reducing non-core costs wherever possible. These measures were implemented throughout the second half of 2008 and as a result the Board expects significant cost savings will be achieved throughout 2009 and beyond.

Paolo Bert, Chief Executive, commented: 

"The business has performed well in a difficult economic environment during 2008. We are greatly encouraged by the continuing support that we have received from our industrial partners, and we look forward to demonstrating our recent technical progress at the FC Expo in February. As a result of our cost savings, Acta is now funded through to December of 2010."

- Ends -

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Notes to Editors

About Acta 

Acta develops and manufactures unique patented catalysts which have been launched to the renewable energy, automotive, battery and industrial markets. Acta is also developing other commercial opportunities using its catalysts for industrial waste treatment.

Acta's catalysts and alkaline system know-how are at the heart of the Company's development of a new, high pressure water electrolyser technology which has demonstrated low cost, platinum free, high pressure hydrogen generation. Combined with a platinum free fuel cell, the system offers a solution to the problem of how to store surplus energy produced from large scale, intermittent renewable energy sources (eg wind farms).

Acta's catalysts are also undergoing customer tests in applications such as ammonia treatment (removal of ammonia from an industrial waste stream), and zinc-air batteries (a high performance and environmentally friendly battery technology), as well as fuel cell and other applications.