Power Air expects to ship fuel cells in 2008

Livermore, Calif.-based fuel cell developer Power Air (OTC: PWAC) said today it expects to start shipping commercial fuel cells in less than a year.

"Recent efforts to miniaturize our proprietary Zinc Air Fuel Cell (ZAFC) technology - particularly over the past six months - have met with much greater success than anticipated," said Remy Kozak, president and CEO of Power Air.

Power Air, which said it hopes to be the first commercially viable fuel cell company, expects to be ready to start shipments of the mobile version of its power pack by Nov. 1, 2008.

"In our ongoing efforts to meet internal development milestones, we have pioneered a device-agnostic Zinc Air-based cell that we believe is capable of materially outperforming current back-up/emergency battery power solutions for electronic mobile and portable devices, including iPods, cell phones and laptops, among others," said Kozak.

The company set up a tight deadline for itself, stating it plans to produce and test an initial prototype of the power pack for by the end of this year, completing design freeze, pre-production readiness review, pilot production plan and quality plan by March 2008.

Power Air said it would conduct field trials and commence to build order backlog by June 2008, and implement pilot production by September 2008.

Kozak said the company expects to release a laptop computer version of the fuel cell approximately six months after the mobile product hits the market.

Founded in 2005, Power Air's technology was originally developed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

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