More Solyndra-style failure: Obama-tied Amonix Inc lays off most of company

More Solyndra-style failure: Obama-tied Amonix Inc lays off most of company By Neil Munro - The Daily Caller 12:56 PM 01/30/2012

Some of President Barack Obama’s top donors and fundraising bundlers are partners in Amonix Inc., the latest Solyndra-like corporate crash. The company has announced a layoff of 200 workers — two-thirds of its workforce — despite a federal green-technology tax credit of $5.9 million in 2010.

The investors include John Doerr’s venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Daniel Weiss’ Angeleno Group LLC and Steve Westly’s eponymous Westly Group, according to Amonix’s website.

These three investors have also invested heavily in Obama and other Democrats — and the president’s aides are now trying to minimize the political damage.

According to a database maintained by the Center for Responsive Politics, Doerr has donated $171,900 since 2008. Weiss has donated $26,480 and Westly has donated $181,250. Nearly all of those contributions went to Democrats.

Obama publicly lauded Amonix in 2010 as an example of a company deserving federal support and private-sector investment.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and other GOP figures are portraying these mutual favors as “crony capitalism,” and the charges are adding up to a real political headache for the administration.

They’re such a headache that the Obama campaign’s first televised issues ad sought to shield the president from the fallout by criticizing its critics.

Amonix is another company declaring bankruptcy after not being able to make it in the solar energy market. This is another company that was heavily subsidized by the federal government with 6 million dollars in tax credits and a 15 million dolllar grant from the US Department of Energy. The company has only been open for 14 months.

This is one of a long line of clean energy companies that have recently failed or faced difficulty

* Solar Trust of America - Opened in 2009 and went bankrupt in April of 2012. Solar Trust received a 2.1 billion dollar loan guarantee from the Dept of Energy but fortunately turned it down.

* Bright Source - Opened in 2008 and is still in business thanks to a last minute 1.6 billion dollar loan in March of 2011 that staved off financial failure. Interestingly enough, the loan is now part of an ethics probe. Apparently, Bright Source hired Vice President Joe Biden’s former chief of staff to lobby the administration for the loan.

* Solyndra - Founded in 2005 and bankrupt in August of 2011. Solyndra was considered for a US Dept of Energy Loan by the Bush Administration, but it was eventually unanimously declined. In March 2009, the US Dept of Energy approved a 527 million loan even though a budget analys stated that the project “This deal is not ready for prime time.” Solyndra received a 25 million dollar tax break from California. To help sales, in 2010, the IRS chipped in and gave an additional 30% tax credit for customers who installed 10,000 dollars worth of Solyndra panels.

* Azure Dynamics - In another case of good fortune, the DOE did not give a grant or loan to Azure Dynamics before it declared bankruptcy in the spring of 2012. The state of Michigan did give a 1.7 million dollar tax credit in 2009. Azure did receive a four year 112 million dollar contract from the Government Service Agency which allowed the military and government agencies to order the Transit Connect EV.

Related to this, Johnson Controls received a 299 millon dollar grant from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and 168.5 millions dollars in incentives from the state of Michigan to build a plant in Holland, MI. This plant was supposed to work in conjunction with Azure Dynamics to build electric vehicles. The bankruptcy unfortunately has caused a slow down in production at the plant and caused Johnson Controls to lose money that it invested in Azure Dynamics.

* Beacon Power - Beacon was founded in 1997 and went bankrupt in October of 2011. In 2009, Beacon received a 43 million dollar loan guarantee for the DOE. Beacon also received an additional 29 million dollars in grants from Pennsylvania and the US. As a side note, in Feb of 2012, Rockland Capital, a private equity group, bought most of the companies assets. As another aside, partner Joseph Lambeth of Rockland gave 20,000 to the DNC and Barack Obama in 2011.

* Abound Solar - Abound Solar received a 400 million dollar loan from the DOE in 2010. In declared bankruptcy in June of 2012. Forutnately for tax payers, it is reported that only 40 to 60 million dollars of the loan will be lost after the sale of assets. In 2010, President Obama praised the company in one of his speeches: “The second company is Abound Solar Manufacturing, which will manufacture advanced solar panels at two new plants, creating more than 2,000 construction jobs and 1,500 permanent jobs.” Pat Stryker, one of the wealthiest 400 people in America, was a major back of the plant and a bundler for President Obama.

* Evergreen Solar - Founded in 1994, it went bankrupt in August of 2011. Evergreen received 58 million dollars in financial aid from the state of Massachusetts. After the bankruptcy, Evergreen was sued by the DOE in order to prevent it from selling patents to firms not based in the US. It is argued that these patents were developed between 2002 and 2005 using a 3 million dollar federal grant.

* Ener1 - Ener1 received a 118.5 million dollar grant from the DOE in 2010. The company declared bankruptcy in March of 2012. In January of 2011, Vice President Biden visited Ener1 in order to proclaim how successful it was.

* Uni-Solar - Uni-Solar received a 13.275 million dollar federal tax credit in January of 2010. Then, in June of 2012, Uni-Solar declared bankruptcy. In May of 2006, The Greenville City Council approved 45 millions dollars worth of incentives for Uni-Solar. These included tax breaks, grants, and employee training.

* Energy Conversion Devices - Another Michigan company declared bankruptcy in February of 2012. This company was a subsidiary of Uni-Solar. In the Spring of 2009, it did receive a 13.3 million dollar tax credit from the stimulus program and it was predicted that the company would create 600 new jobs. In order to save money, in August of 2010, it shipped 140 jobs from its Michigan factory to Mexico.

* A123 Systems - In August of 2009, A123 received 249 million dollar grant from the DOE. Part of the grant was used to refurbish plants in Livonia and Romulus MI. In November of 2011, 125 workers were laid off from these plants after A123 produced faulty batteries for another DOE grant recipient Fisker Automotive. The faulty batteries were quite the embarrassment since they prevent consumer reports from test a Fisker automobile. As of now, there is a 55 million dollar recall effort out by A123 to reclaim faulty batteries. The DOE grant was supposed to be completely used by the end of 2012, but the DOE has extended the period to the end of 2014. In 2011, A123 lost 257 million dollars in 2011, 152.6 million in 2010, and 85 million in 2009. At the start of 2010, A123’s stock price was over 20 per share. Now it is under 90 cents. It is currently being sued by a NY based law firm over inadequacies in disclosure related to the defective batteries.

Between 2008 up until now, executives from the company donated more than 22000 dollars to Barack Obama, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Senator John Kerry, and Representative Ed Markey while sending 1000 dollars to Scott Brown.

* Ecotality - In August of 2009, Ecotality received a 99.8 million dollar grant from the DOE. In June of 2010, it received another 15 million dollar grant from the DOE. Since June of 2010, Ecotatlity has been investigated by the SEC for stock issues, sued the state of California for working with NRG in building a competing network of charging stations. Ecotatlity turned it first ever profit in the first quarter of 2012, making 1.2 million dollars. The stock was valued at 34.80 in August of 2007. In July of 2012, it is valued at .47 per share.

* SunPower - The already financially troubled SunPower (800 million in debt) received a 1.2 billion dollar loan guarantee from the DOE in the spring of 2011. Shortly thereafter, it sold a 60% stake of itself to French Energy company Total, who then gave the company a 1 billion dollar credit line. The 1.2 billion dollar loan was to be used to create a solar power ranch. This was actually sold to NRG. The ranch is projected to create 15 full time jobs. Representative George Miller has stated that SunPower is a success after touring one of its plants. Mr Miller’s son works for the lobbying firm employed by SunPower. Interestingly enough, after the Solyendra scandal broke, someone at the DOE went back and scrubbed the website of references to SunPower.

The Obama Administration has stated over and over that each of these companies received funding based on merit. In the book “Throw Them All Out”, the author Peter Schweizer shows that 71% of the DOE grants and loans went to bundlers for Obama’s Presidential campaign, members of Obama’s National Finance Committee, or large donors to the Democratic Party. The 71% raised 457,834 dollars for Obama and the Democratic Party. The 71% received 11.35 billion dollars in DOE handouts.

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