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July 21, 2009
Kelowna,
BC, Canada: Allora Minerals Signs Binding Letter of Intent to
Purchase Optisolar Manufacturing Facilities
Allora
Minerals, Inc. has signed a binding letter-of-intent to purchase
manufacturing facilities, production lines, intellectual property
and an R&D facility of Optisolar Technologies, Inc.
EPOD
Solar, which recently came public through a reverse merger (presently
called Allora Minerals, but changing its name), is a vertically
integrated thin film manufacturer and developer of solar parks.
Under
the terms of the letter of intent, Allora plans to purchase the
OptiSolar assets for a value of $260 million in an all stock transaction,
priced at $21.66 per share, resulting in the issuance of 12 million
shares of Allora common stock to Optisolar shareholders.
Included
in the purchase are:
Hayward,
California R&D Facility - 95,000 square foot R&D production level
facility including 2 single junction 15MW production lines, proprietary
inverter lab and other intellectual property. Allora will take
over the lease on the facility.
Sacramento,
California Manufacturing Facility - 1 million square foot manufacturing
facility that is prepared for up to forty, 20MW dual junction
lines (800MW in total) or a similar amount of triple Junction
line which would then be capable of expanding to 1,000MW. The
facility also includes automated panel manufacturing (APA) technology
which enables panels to be assembled in the factory robotically
as opposed to manually, in the field, which reduces the cost to
build Solar park and increases the speed at which parks can be
built .
Mike
Matvieshen, President and CEO of Allora Minerals, said that "This
acquisition is a significant milestone for our business. We now
have a manufacturing facility capable of scaling to 1GW in nameplate
production capacity. We have increased our manufacturing capacity
immediately from 5MW to 30MW. In the near term we plan to convert
our single junction lines to dual junction lines, expanding capacity
to 55MW."
"Optisolar
had invested about $310 million into the R&D lab, Hayward CA manufacturing
Facility and the Sacramento assets which we are purchasing. This
is a tremendous value to our business and to our shareholders,"
added Matvieshen. "The acquisition of Optisolar's intellectual
property and its state-of-the-art production size R&D facility,
Gives us a real advantage because with the on going business because
this allows all new developments in production improvement to
be immediately implemented in the factory, and its inverter technology
will accelerate our path to reducing the cost-per-installed-watt
to under $1.35 fully installed. This, in turn, will drive higher
profitability to our solar parks when selling electricity."
The
product qualification process at the production facility has been
completed. It is anticipated that at the start of production,
the plant will employ approximately 168 workers.
In
February, Optisolar had submitted a $300 million loan guarantee
application to the U.S. Department of Energy for the start of
its Sacramento facility. Allora intends to move the loan application
along and to open/reopen it, and is currently being advised by
its counsel with respect to necessary steps.
In
addition, Allora Mineral announced today that EPOD Erneurbare
Energien GmbH (EEEG), an EPOD Solar, Inc. subsidiary which it
has agreed to purchase in an Asset and Stock Purchase Agreement
executed on June 30, 2009 has received preliminary approval from
Thüringen Aufbaubank for €23.5 million in grants.
EEEG
plans to build a 30MW solar manufacturing facility in Thüringen,
Germany, and had applied for the grants based on the regional
development programs defined by the European Commission.
On
July 13, the Thüringen Aufbaubank gave its preliminary approval
to EEEG for fulfilling basic criteria and therefore being eligible
for the grants.
Further details about: EPOD
Solar
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