Full-spectrum stored energy equipment supplier Oakridge Global Energy Solutions is one of the upcoming leaders when it comes to manufacturing on-shore. It’s a trend that has picked up considerable steam in recent years, as more and more companies look at the significant benefits on-shoring provides, such as proximity to end markets, improved process security, and the rapidly diminishing labor cost gap when compared to off-shoring. OGES is based in Florida’s Space Coast, a region just north of the Treasure Coast around Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. This is the now densely packed region which historically was the home to NASA-launched manned spaceflights and has long been a key location for USAF unmanned military and civilian rocket launches, as well as (more recently) numerous aerospace companies and UAV technology developers.
Oakridge Global Energy Solutions prides itself on offering a full range of high-quality, American-made energy storage solutions; solutions which run the gamut from specially designed pressure tolerant cells and the Liberty Series of starter motor batteries for light vehicles and watercraft, to the extended duration battery systems of the company’s Patriot Series for various military and civilian remotely operated vehicles. The company also has a ProSeries line of heavy duty battery systems for task-oriented vehicles like NEV (neighborhood electric vehicle) platforms and golf carts. The ProSeries line of specially formulated high energy lithium-ion battery solutions, in particular, showcases the company’s proprietary user interface and battery management system combo, known as the Range Commander, superbly well. The Range Commander system enables remote real-time performance monitoring of the lab-tested, field-proven ProSeries via any internet-connected device, including smartphones and tablets. This feature set is of particular interest to investors, as it highlights the engineering prowess and user-oriented design insightfulness OGES has become known for.
The ProSeries is aimed squarely at a core global NEV market that was worth around $1.8 billion just two years ago and which has been growing by leaps and bounds, with Research and Markets recently projecting a 6.6 percent CAGR through 2020, as consumers from across a wide variety of usage types continue to flock to golf carts and light electric vehicles like NEVs due to their tighter functional efficiency, cost metrics, and lower environmental impact. Initially slated for 40Ah, 60Ah, 100Ah and 160Ah configurations, the ProSeries is also destined to see 200Ah and 240Ah incarnations sometime next year, and the company has rigorously tested these systems for the equivalent of five and a half years of continuous daily cycling (over 2,000 charge/discharge cycles).
Another major area of development for OGES is on-site stationary power, with the recent announcement of the latest installment in the company’s Freedom Series of stationary power storage product, the Freedom IV, having been announced in late September this year. Designed to allow homes, as well as a wide range of business types, the freedom to cost-effectively migrate away from sometimes unreliable backup generators powered by diesel or gasoline, OGES’ Freedom IV system offers a safety net ranging from 6.5kWh hours to over 35kWh. Manufactured right here in America, these babies are slated to start shipping late this year (December), and much like Tesla’s (NASDAQ: TSLA) Powerwall, are engineered in such a way that they can be easily daisy-chained to scale up storage capacity. The Freedom IV systems can also be easily interfaced with standalone alternative energy sources such as wind or solar, making the units especially appealing for off-grid applications, or remote sites. Moreover, these clean, lithium-ion battery based backup systems can be programmed to charge during off-peak intervals when grid-supplied electricity is cheapest, offering customers a way to easily bypass the centralized, utility-centric pricing model for energy.
OGES has a deep bench of engineering talent at its disposal and demand for its products has been solid, leading the company to recently announce its plans to expand an already impressive domestic manufacturing footprint by nearly 450 percent. Fast on the heels of an announcement back in September that the company has secured a long-term supply agreement with one of the top manufacturers of lithium-ion battery assembly hardware, this latest announcement about expanding the company’s production capacity – just the latest in a long series of moves by OGES as part of its $270 million investment in its Brevard County operations – has garnered much support and attention within the state of Florida.
CEO of the Space Coast Economic Development Commission, as well as the Mayor of Palm Bay and multiple local business leaders, were on hand earlier this month at a major press conference held at the company’s new Palm Bay HQ, where the Governor of Florida, Rick Scott, awarded OGES the coveted Governor’s Business Ambassador Medal for its contributions to the region’s economy, shortly after having toured the new 68,718 square foot facility. Set to create another 1,000 good, high-paying manufacturing jobs in the region, OGES’ plant expansion is a bold move that signifies to markets how serious the company is about its strategy to not only deliver new, innovative stored energy products/solutions, but build out an industrial-scale domestic manufacturing architecture that can service the full gamut of lithium-ion form factors and applications currently being targeted by the company.
The government market and civilian UAV space are both hot properties for OGES, with the company’s APQP (advanced product quality planning) development methodologies making its extremely robust systems ideal for the former, as well as top-shelf for the latter. The extremely reliable precision manufactured cells and battery systems produced by OGES, as well as its single point of contact/full service solution approach to design, have already won the company many admirers within government markets. Having designed and tested systems that can perform in some of the harshest, most demanding applications and environments known to man, including operating at 10,000 PSI, at extreme temperatures and under continuous, harsh shocks and vibrations, OGES is supremely confident about its ability to continue to woo government clients when it comes to applications like extended-duration military UUV’s (unmanned underwater vehicles) and the like. Let’s face it, when it comes to extended missions in harsh environments, a reliable, high-performance power source is paramount. And it is equally important for government entities to be able to source those power systems from domestic U.S. manufacturers with Six Sigma-grade development processes, and which can be relied upon for ensuring that platform security targets are achievable.
It’s easy to understand why the Governor is so excited about the company’s decision to expand here in the U.S. alongside other Space Coast companies like UAS (unmanned aircraft system) engineering and ISR (intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) flight systems outfit, L2 Aerospace, and OGES is firmly committed to continuing to build up its domestic manufacturing capacity in response to growing demand, even though the company could just as easily set up shop overseas. Oakridge Global Energy Solutions is one of a handful of well-positioned American manufacturers destined to make big waves in the rapidly emerging world of UAV/UUV and other unmanned systems, and its presence in Florida’s Space Coast region speaks volumes to savvy investors who understand the inside baseball of the unmanned systems industry. More importantly, the same features and capabilities that make the company’s battery systems a no-brainer when it comes to government markets, also makes the products a real winner for civilian consumer applications, and it is just a matter of time before OGES fully realizes the fruits of its ongoing manufacturing and corporate expansion initiatives.
The company’s Patriot Series of products for radio controlled vehicles likes drones, multi-rotor copters, as well as UAV/UUV and land-based platforms, with their long-lasting power supply capabilities enabled by OGES’ proprietary chemistry formulation (set to debut next year in 2500mAh, 5000mAh and 10000mAh versions), will no doubt be snapped up by R/C battery demand from throughout the civilian and government markets. This is an extremely important area of the company’s operations for investors to keep a close eye on and the superior performance characteristics of the OGES Patriot Series, which does not exhibit the puffing and swelling, or poor lifecycle performance too often routinely associated with foreign manufactured batteries in this segment, are significant advantages that will continue to spell big business for this still relatively small, share price-accessible ($300 million market cap) company.
Top of the line cells, batteries and power systems, manufactured in the U.S. by a company which is one of the most compelling leaders today when it comes to manufacturing on-shoring, is a pretty good sales pitch for future shareholder returns, and OGES is an attractive property that investors really need to be paying significantly more attention to. But if you read nothing but the main stream finance press, you might get the impression that $219 per share Tesla – recently described by renowned hedge fund manager, Jim Chanos, founder and president of Kynikos Associates, as an overpriced car company – was the only player in the game today.
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