Development funding ticks up at Strategic Elements as autonomous security deployment nears
Strategic Elements recorded $441,000 in net expenditure for investees Australian Advanced Materials and Stealth Technologies.
Pooled development fund Strategic Elements (ASX: SOR) has unveiled performance figures covering the last three months of 2020 – a quarter in which the company completed a $5.1 million capital raise and recorded $753,000 in group expenditure.
According to filed accounts, the fund ended last year with around $6 million in cash.
In a statement to the market, Strategic Elements said it was focused on advancing its investees’ projects including the Australian Advanced Materials venture, which is developing an innovative memory and battery technology; and the advancement of Stealth Technologies’ robotics and artificial intelligence technology.
Strategic Elements declared Stealth Technologies had pushed up its total research and development expenditure and cited “additional engineering work”, undertaken in preparation for an autonomous security vehicle (ASV) deployment in tandem with US-based logistics giant Honeywell for the WA Department of Justice.
The two investees received $441,000 in spending with Stealth Technologies confirming it invested a further $298,000 to develop the ASV expensed directly on final R&D development, staff and operating costs.
In addition, Strategic Elements said its spending in resources sector innovation was “minimal” with Maria Resources receiving $9,000 in income while expensing $38,000 in development expenditure.
“Due to the approximate $1 million in funding, secured by Australian Advanced Materials (AAM) in a collaborative grant announced under the ARC Linkage project, AAM only incurred $10,000 in direct costs in the December quarter,” the company said.
Stealth Technologies received $10,000 in contract revenue and $12,000 in government grants in Q4 2020.
With research and development spending ticking up in the last quarter, Stealth Technologies also announced a series of ASV agreements including with Honeywell, CSIRO, Planck AeroSystems and the University of Western Australia School of Agriculture and Environment.
Meanwhile, Strategic Elements said that AAM achieved “significant developments” regarding the self-charging battery and claimed it “significantly progressed” its nanocube memory ink technology in agreement with the University of New South Wales and the CSIRO.