Ceres Power increases H1 losses but remains confident

11th Mar 2015 13:40

Ceres Power saw its revenues and losses rise during the first half of the year after ending a "legacy" product and supply agreement with Bord Gais Eireann.Revenues fell sharply by 85% to £133m, while pre-tax losses widened 40% to £5.36m, driving losses per share to rise from 0.62p to 0.64p.The fuel cell technology developer said it increased its costs during the period as invested in producing new technology and employed more people.However, underlying revenue and other operating income has increased 30% to £0.43m due to an increase of UK government grants from £0.18m to £0.29m.The group announced it raised £20m from investors, creating the balance sheet strength to engage with partners for the next stage of the Ceres Steel Cell technology.Chairman Alan Aubrey said the group is "positioned for the future" and is "confident that we will soon see this progress further advancing our current commercial opportunities".N+1 Singer analysts said: "Although we trim our near term revenue forecasts, we continue to believe that Ceres is well placed to play a leading role in the development of the fuel cell industry.""We see particularly exciting potential in Japan, where the government has ambitious targets in place and Ceres recently announced a JDA with a global power systems company.Shares were up 1.15% to 8.8p on Wednesday at 14:04.