Handheld charger still in the works
A plague of trademark disputes and court cases took eZelleron and its kraftwerk product virtually off the grid for five long years. Then, last October, kraftwerk TUBES chief executive Sascha Kühn informed H2-international that the business is coming out of “stealth mode” to demonstrate the fruits of quiet progress.
In April 2016, eZelleron, a German startup, filed for bankruptcy protection (see H2-international, August 2016). Now, its former CEO, Sascha Kühn, was charged with violating accounting principles, committing fraud and deepening the company’s insolvency, the Dresdner Neueste Nachrichten newspaper has reported. Kühn left Germany for the United States to head kraftwerk Inc. and eZelleron Inc. based in Silicon Valley. He is alleged to have filed balance sheets too late
Buyers of “kraftwerk” fuel cell chargers may have to wait a little longer still. The manufacturer of the devices, eZelleron, cited an ongoing legal dispute about trademark rights and intellectual property as the reason for having to postpone shipments even further. Sascha Kühn, CEO of eZelleron, told H2-international that he would like to provide more details on the situation, but the charges which Kraftwerk, an electronic music band, had brought against the company just 5 days after its crowdfunding campaign ended
While some talk about the bankruptcy of start-up eZelleron from Dresden, Germany, others only say that the headquarters were relocated to the US. How much truth is to these rumors? First, what is certain is that the delivery of fuel cell device kraftwerk will be late, as bankruptcy proceedings for eZelleron GmbH began on April 18, 2016, at the local court in Dresden.
November 2015 saw the publication of the Fuel Cell Industry Review 2015, including market data and analyses for 2015. Since 2014, a team led by E4tech had contacted fuel cell companies around the globe, aggregated their supply figures and can now show the latest trends in the industry, much as Fuel Cell Today had done before its survey came to a halt. The following will present some excerpts from the review.
For several months, speculation has been rife concerning the continuation of the National Innovation Program for Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technology (NIP), or a possible NIP 2.0. To ensure that the ideas on the configuration of the revised program aren’t rejected before it has even got off the ground, it is worth taking a brief look back: what, exactly, were the contents and goals of the NIP 1.0?
eZelleron has won its case against Kraftwerk musician Ralf Hütter. On 16th April 2015, Dr. Sascha Kühn, Managing Director of the Dresden-based fuel cell manufacturer had to appear at Hamburg district court because the leader of the German electro-pop-band Kraftwerk had claimed ownership of the name rights for the “Kraftwerk” and had submitted injunctions in the USA and Germany. Despite Kühn’s previous attempts to come to an amicable agreement the matter was resolved in the court room in