'What Auto Industry Collapse?' Electric-Drive Maker UQM Asks As Sales Soar

'What Auto Industry Collapse?' Electric-Drive Maker UQM Asks As Sales Soar

Company's Strong Year-End Showing Portends Significant Growth For EVs and Hybrids

By John O'Dell, Senior Editor

The mainstream auto industry is, well, sucking wind. But at least one company in the advanced powerplant industry says it is doing pretty well, thank you.

As automakers big and little, and truck makers with incredibly fuel-conscious customers strive to boost their vehicles' fuel economy and move away from dependence on conventional internal combustion engines, electric propulsion system maker UQM Technologies has announced a 68 percent hike in its third-quarter revenue.

The company, which started life in the late 1960s as a manufacturer of fiberglass kit cars and dune buggies,  isn't making a profit yet. But the strong October-December period that saw it post $2.8 million in revenue ($2.1 million of that from sales of its products) helped it trim its loses by 41 percent.

The showing came as orders for UQM's electric drive systems for battery-electric and hybrid-electric cars and trucks started pouring in, said Bill Rankin, the Colorado-based company's president and chief executive.

Our focus on vehicle electrification seems to be finally paying off," he told Green Car Advisor.

That focus began in the late 1970s, when UQM designed and built its own battery-electric car, the Electrek (right). It sold 75 of them from 1978-82. That led to development of a proprietary permanent magnet electric motor technology and the company's never looked back.

"We are very well positioned to benefit from President Obama's alternative energy push," Rankin said.

Indeed, UQM counts three major automakers with hybrid or electric car projects under development among its clients (one appears to be Chrysler, although the company won't verify that).

It also is supplying electric propulsion systems, generators and power system controllers to eight "entrepreneurial automobile companies" that hope someday to be major automakers and have "begun to place sizable orders with us," Rankin said.

As with the major automakers, he wouldn't identify the smaller builders except to say that several have publicly announced plans to being "limited quantities" of vehicles to market later this year.

In addition to automotive clients, UQM claims a customer list that includes players in the truck, bus, construction, agricultural and military vehicle markets.

That kind of activity, and UQM's growth at a time other companies are downsizing and hollering for federal bailouts, suggests that a real shift is taking place in the auto industry - one that will hurt a lot of mainstream companies that dithered too long before seeing that an important piece of the future is going to be electric.

But, said Rankin, "there are going to be some winners and we expect to be among them."

We wish him - and his competitors in the field of electric car technologies - all the best.

John O'Dell:  is an AutoObserver Senior Editor. Follow @AutoObserver on Twitter.