Completion of Laboratory Facility Expansion

RNS Number : 5452W

Ilika plc

29 January 2013

 

Ilika plc

("Ilika" or the "Company")

Completion of Laboratory Facility Expansion

Ilika plc (AIM: IKA), the advanced cleantech materials company, announces the completion of a 200 m² expansion of its facility in Southampton. The expansion has been undertaken to facilitate further growth across the Company and to fulfill three principal goals:

The largest part (50%) of the expansion is associated with Ilika's solid-state battery technology. This infrastructure and equipment will support Ilika's activities producing prototype electrochemical cells and batteries during the next phase of its development programme, which is starting in the first quarter of 2013.

The second aim of the expansion has been to create additional capacity for the testing of materials generated from Ilika's joint development programmes. A number of new, high throughput techniques have been deployed for the rapid characterization of the physical properties of the materials which Ilika jointly develops with its commercial partners. This additional capacity underpins Ilika's ability to ramp revenues in 2013/14.

Finally, the new facilities are also accommodating the high throughput polymer equipment relocated from its divested Sheffield facility. This equipment is currently deployed in joint development programmes spanning a number of sectors, including breakthrough applications for composite materials in the electronics sector.

Despite the expansion of the main facilities in Southampton, cost savings associated with discontinuing temporary lab facilities in Southampton and the disposal of the Company's Sheffield operations mean that total facility overheads are now expected to be marginally lower year-on-year.

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