Another Obama picked "winner" on its way down
This week, two months after a costly and embarrassing battery recall, A123 Systems released sharply lower first-quarter revenues and earnings: The battery innovator posted a first-quarter loss of $125 million, with revenues down 40 percent from the first quarter of 2011, a result far worse than investors had anticipated, according to the Wall Street Journal. Struggling to regain confidence and in desperate need of a short-term cash infusion, the maker of nano-technology-enabled lithium ion batteries announced it was seeking strategic guidance.
Over the years, A123 Systems has received extensive support from the U.S. Advanced Battery Consortium and obtained $128.6 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Energy to build a manufacturing plant in Michigan. With Republicans eager to highlight Obama Administration failures in "picking technology," could the A123 situation turn into a significant political liability for the president, like the Solyndra debacle? |
