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1. Detroit Electric Ditches ZAP, Looks to Malaysia for Production
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2. Eka Lands Smart Meter Deal with GE, too
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3. AltaRock Seals Deal to Explore for Hot Rocks
Detroit Electric Ditches ZAP, Looks to Malaysia for Production
Craig Rubens - Startups
So what happened to the former deal? ZAP says it has agreed to sell its ownership rights in Detroit Electric for $750,000, the amount it had originally invested in the JV, and gain exclusive rights to distribute Detroit Electric vehicles in North America. According to a ZAP press release that quotes Lam, China Youngman Automobile Group will also give up its ownership under a separate agreement. We are waiting to hear back from China Youngman on the situation.
ZAP CEO Steve Schneider tells us that the sale is part of ZAP’s effort to focus on electric car distribution and marketing. Schneider also says that the Detroit Electric joint venture fell apart when ZAP and partner Youngman Automotive Group, a Chinese bus maker, couldn’t agree on what vehicle to pursue first. "Most of it had to do with they wanted to do buses first and we wanted to do cars first."
According to an SEC filing, the Detroit Electric joint venture, named after America’s oldest and longest-running electric car company, was launched in September of 2007 with Youngman. Originally called EV Holdings Ltd. and incorporated in Hong Kong, the venture was renamed Detroit Electric early this year. ZAP and Youngman had originally agreed to invest a total of $100 million in the venture, but the companies quickly agreed to revise that to just $5 million, $2.5 million each. However, even that truncated investment was never made, and both ZAP and Youngman were unsuccessful in securing outside financing to help float the nascent Detroit Electric, according to the SEC filing.
The reformed company could be faring better (well, it couldn’t do worse) and was unveiled at a press event at Malaysian automaker Proton’s test track today. The company is still led by Lam, former CEO of Lotus Engineering, and the venture has reportedly already entered into a partnership with several Dutch, American and Malaysian investors with an investment of about $300 million over the next five years.
But no business partners have been named and no actual Detroit Electric made cars were shown off at the event. So far the company seems to be just a lot of talk, though Lam himself could not be reached for comment.
As for ZAP, it’s had its fair share of trouble before. Under Detroit Electric, Zap was planning to sell its much anticipated, but yet to be seen, ZAP Alias, and Schneider tells us that the Detroit Electric sale won’t affect the Alias release date of sometime in 2009. He did tell us the three-wheeled electric vehicle will be manufactured in the U.S., but he said he doesn’t know which brand the Alias will eventually be sold under.
Schneider says that, at the earliest, he hopes to unveil the first running production vehicle from Detroit Electric at the National Auto Dealers Association convention in January of 2009. That’s just a few mere months away. While the big automakers are pushing their production plans forward, it’s still not clear what sort of backing Detroit Electric has that will allow it to reach its ambitious goals.
Eka Lands Smart Meter Deal with GE, too
Katie Fehrenbacher - CNN Green
With utilities increasingly adding in energy-efficiency technology like smart meters, GE has been working with various tech companies to provide utilities with the most intelligent gear and software; GE has also partnered with Silver Springs Networks, and Itron for its I-210 line. Eka champions wireless mesh networks, because mesh technology can provide one of the cheapest available wireless options. Utilities could run connected smart-meter services over wireless mesh for just a fraction of the price of using, say, a phone company's cellular network.
Smart-meter technology is just starting to be deployed in the United States. Northern California utility PG&E has installed just 900,000 smart electric meters and gas modules, but it has a goal of installing 10.3 million total of both types by the end of 2011. That's like the early '90s were in terms of Internet adoption.
Based in Germantown, Md., Eka has reportedly raised around $40 million in funding to date. Its most recent round, for $18.5 million, which the company announced in July, was led by Flybridge Capital Partners and including the Angeleno Group, RockPort Capital Partners, The Westly Group and Metropolitan Investment.
AltaRock Seals Deal to Explore for Hot Rocks
Craig Rubens - Startups
The 14-month-old startup is flush with $26.25 million of recent funding, including $6.25 million from Google.org and investments from Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Paul Allen’s Vulcan Capital. That money will be used to start construction on a demonstration plant at an undisclosed site next year.
The location of Weyerhaeuser’s forests are near states with renewable portfolio standards like California, Oregon, Washington and Nevada. Geothermal energy is especially attractive to utilities as it can operate 24 hours a day, providing reliable base-load electricity.
Now that AltaRock has the money and the land, it needs a demonstration plant to show off its proprietary engineered geothermal system. Conventional geothermal energy is collected from naturally occurring pockets of underground hot water whose steam can be used to run a turbine, like the reservoir Raser Technologies just tapped in Utah that could produce 238 megawatts of geothermal energy.
What makes AltaRock’s technology “engineered” is that AltaRock creates its own hydrothermal reservoirs by fracturing huge rocks and pumping water underground. This means the technology can be deployed almost anywhere — even close to existing transmission lines, the company says.
Weyerhaeuser has been pursuing its own diverse land management strategy to tap the potential of its assets. Earlier this year the forestry firm launched a joint venture with Chevron called Catchlight Energy, focused on non-food cellulosic biofuel production.
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