Reports have surfaced of a Bloom stock offering.
GreenTech Media and media sources reported that Bloom made a filing under a provision of securities law for smaller companies that allows confidentially.
Bloom is based in California’s Silicon Valley and uses technology developed by NASA for colonization of Mars to provide electric power from fuel cells. The fuel typically comes from natural gas, although landfill gas can also be used.
Click here for past coverage of Bloom Energy
Bloom operates a plant in Newark. The company been quiet about its activities in the past year after earlier disclosing that it had come up with a more efficient and compact fuel cell system that could be used in locations, such as the rooftops of high-rise buildings.
There have been a number of announcements about deployment of fuel cells in California and Connecticut. Both states offer big incentives. Fortune also reported that Apple will use the fuel cells at its headquarters, which is currently under construction. Home Depot has already disclosed plans to use Bloom fuel cells in high energy cost states like New York and California.
The company has fallen far short of employment projections for the Newark plant under an agreement with the State of Delaware.
Under that deal, Bloom fuel cells feed electric power into the grid, with the additional charges of that electricity borne by Delmarva Power customers. Legislation allowed the approach to qualify as an alternative energy source, even though natural gas is used. The company cited the clean-burning nature of the fuel and the ability of fuel cells to operate in extreme conditions.
Bloom has targeted fuel cells as a cleaner alternative to the back-up power sources used by many companies that often employ diesel generators that are noisy and release pollutants.
The lack of a stock offering has often been cited by Bloom critics of a sign that the company is failing. By contrast, a stock offeirng might also indicate that the company may now believe it is turning the corner.
Bloom has been financed with a reported $1 billion-plus in equity from Silicon Valley investors.
