RE:RE:RE:New Agoracom Interview on HPQ SiliconAnd a great post by Oden6570:
Pascali added, “While we are approached regularly by companies seeking a technology partner, we will only commit our engineering and technical resources to those whose ideas have the most upside. Rarer still is the commercial opportunity where we are willing to take a 50% ownership stake in the initiative, as we have with the fumed silica reactor process. This LOI with a company on the scale and reputation of Evonik helps to confirm both the reasoning behind that approach and the reality of the market potential for our fumed silica process”.
As per the press release, the objective of the LOI is for HSPI to collaborate with Evonik during the pilot scale phase to validate the ability of the FSR to produce low-cost low carbon material acceptable to Evonik’s specifications. This will be a scaling up of the process from HSPI’s first generation samples, which have already proven to satisfy the Evonik specifications.
“Regarding the collaboration on testing fumed silica material, HSPI can leverage the more than 80 years of experience in manufacturing and selling fumed silica materials that Evonik has and represents an incredible opportunity for HSPI as we work diligently to optimize our fumed silica reactor ” added Tourillon.
HPQ Silica Polvere Signs Letter of Intent with Evonik Corporation : Chemical Industry Digest (chemindigest.com)
BCONTVentures wrote: And:
@ordos We are on the cusp here for fumed silica. Bernard said in the interview that he just visited the pilot plant and it is getting ready to produce the material. I am almost certain they already produced during commissioning. Once it produces and samples are shipped, the other fumed silica majors under NDAs will be scrambling, not just awoken. Evonik is the biggest fumed silica producer in the world and they they will do everything they can to own / have exclusive rights to the process and integrate it in its production as soon as possible. They do not have financial difficulties to advance this at "lightning speed", it's in their best interests. From HPQ Silicon's perspective, they will do everything to maximize shareholder value before making any hard deals. BCONTVentures wrote: Great notes from @ordos from the interview:
@ordos My notes from the video interview:
- It's the start of the "fun season"
- Life of a "zombie" the last 2 years because of mostly R&D, testing, piloting
- It's going to be an interesting week, entering great end of Q3, beginning of Q4
- There is life coming back to what we are doing
SiOx Battery Anode Material
- We are so high up compared to what's available out there commercially with graphite anodes that we have a lot of room for degradation to fall to those levels
- We are having discussions with drone manufacturers. A battery is an assembly of multiple cells, such as 18650
- It sounds repetitive, but being able to repeat the results is the key. You have to have consistency, if there is consistency over x number of cycles, there is a market for it
- It's starting to attract more and more attention
- Our timing is perfect
- Graphite based anode manufacturing companies have increasing interest - The SiOx addition is just about 5% of the total weight of batteries, but increase the capacity by 40%
- Discussions are now along the lines of "How much is it going to cost to build the "all these things together""
Fumed Silica
- Bernard visited the pilot plant facility and it is getting ready to start producing
- Evonik is asking for updates regularly
- Other NDA signors are "waking up" and asking for samples
- Strategic decision to give Evonik most of the initial lab-scale plant material (60-100g), we gave less to the other NDAs, so those others could only say "yes, it's good"
- Multiple groups willing to finance us differently
- Not in a rush to make a deal faster, need to think through what's in the best interests of the company and shareholders
- As Bernard was saying we are getting to the point of "too good to be true" to "too good to ignore"
- LinkedIn impressions are "going through the roof"
- There are so many discussions at different levels now
Regarding relationship with Quebec Innovative Materials Company
- HPQ Silicon's transition from resource company to technology company meant that they couldn't own any resource properties. They sold the quartz properties to Quebec Silica (now Quebec Innovative Materials Company). HPQ Silicon owns 3 million shares of QIMC
- There is synergy with QIMC not only to supply quartz for QRR, FSR, etc, but also natural hydrogen to be mixed with exhaust from QRR to produce synthetic fuels
- Balance sheet is going to improve significantly for Q3, because QIMC has appreciated multiples from end of Q2