Press release

Palo Alto, Calif. and Brunnthal, Germany — July 21, 2008 — Frost & Sullivan announced today that it has presented its 2008 Market Leadership Award to SFC Energy AG in recognition of SFC’s success in fuel cell commercialization, first-mover market status and significant progress in 2007.

 

 

“SFC has set the pace for the fuel cell industry,” said Sara Bradford, Frost & Sullivan Energy & Power Director. “By combining low-cost materials and lean production techniques, SFC has successfully reduced the manufacturing costs for direct methanol fuel cells. Additionally, the company has demonstrated strong growth and a proven business model, including the industry’s first commercial product line supported by numerous distribution partners.”

 

 

Based in Brunnthal, Germany, SFC develops and sells direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs) and systems for the leisure, marine, defense, security, measurement and instrumentation, consumer electronics and other industries.

 

 

SFC’s commercially proven business strategy focuses on product readiness, liquid fuel infrastructure and significant customer market traction. The publicly traded company has sold nearly 10,000 fuel cell systems, and over the last three years its revenues have grown more than 122 percent, compounded annually.

 

 

The company’s EFOY brand fuel cells are providing power for recreational vehicles, yachts, vacation homes, traffic monitoring systems, observation stations, measurement- and early-warning stations, light electric vehicles, defense and other applications.

 

 

“This Market Leadership Award highlights our success in commercializing reliable and efficient alternative energy systems for our expanding global customer base,” said Dr. Peter Podesser, CEO of SFC. “It also reflects the fact that our hybrid product strategy has paved the way for fuel cells into fast growing consumer, industrial and defense markets.”

 

 

The EFOY fuel cell units provide between 600 to 1,600 watt-hours per day. By combining the benefits of fuel cell technology and hybrid systems with conventional battery or so-lar power, SFC’s EFOY system has overcome market entry barriers that traditionally have slowed the adoption of fuel cells for many applications.

 

 

“A key challenge for the portable fuel cell industry overall has been to identify efficient distribution strategies for refueling cartridges. SFC has embraced this issue, and has effectively developed a flexible and scalable solution to address their leisure, industrial and defense customers,” Bradford said.

 

 

Each year, Frost & Sullivan presents this Award to the company that has demonstrated global excellence in a given business function such as sales, marketing, customer ser-vice, technology innovation, product quality, supply chain management, and growth strategy. Leveraging best practices in the company to all global units is a major metric in the Award selection process. Frost & Sullivan, through this exhaustive selection process, seeks to identify a recipient that has exhibited global excellence in its operations, resulting in sustained financial growth.

 

Frost & Sullivan Best Practices Awards recognize companies in a variety of regional and global markets for demonstrating outstanding achievement and superior perform-ance in areas such as leadership, technological innovation, customer service, and strategic product development. Industry analysts compare market participants and measure performance through in-depth interviews, analysis, and extensive secondary re-search in order to identify best practices in the industry.

 

 

About Frost & Sullivan
Frost & Sullivan, the Growth Partnership Company, partners with clients to accelerate their growth. The company's TEAM Research, Growth Consulting and Growth Team Membership empower clients to create a growth-focused culture that generates, evaluates and implements effective growth strategies. Frost & Sullivan employs over 45 years of experience in partnering with Global 1000 companies, emerging businesses and the investment community from more than 30 offices on six continents. For more information about Frost & Sullivan’s Growth Partnerships, visit http://www.awards.frost.com.

 

 

Frost & Sullivan Contact:
Jake Wengroff
210.247.3806
jake.wengroff@frost.com

 

 

About SFC Energy AG
SFC Energy AG (www.sfc.com) is market leader in fuel cell technologies for mobile and off-grid power applications serving the leisure, industrial and defense markets. As one of Germany’s technology pioneers, SFC has won numerous innovation awards.  SFC has alliances with leading companies in a wide range of industries. Unlike most other fuel cell manufacturers, who are in the research and development phase or run subsidized demonstration projects, SFC has shipped 9,000 fully commercial products to industrial and private end users for four years, and has created a convenient fuel cartridge supply infrastructure. SFC is DIN ISO 9001:2000 certified.

 

 

SFC Press Contact:
Ulrike Schramm
Public Relations Manager
SFC Energy AG
Eugen-Saenger-Ring 4
D-85649 Brunnthal
Tel. +49 89 673 592-379
Fax. +49 89 673 592-368
Email: ulrike.schramm@sfc.com
Web: www.sfc.com