Shares of vanadium miner Bushveld Minerals Limited (LON: BMN) rallied 13.3% after the company announced that it had made a $7.5 million investment in Enerox GmbH, a vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) manufacturer.
The miner is part of an investment consortium that has invested $30 million in Enerox to increase its production capacity to 30MW (120-240 MWh) by 2022. Enerox further plans to up its production capacity to 150 MW (600-1,200 MWh) by 2025.
Bushveld previously invested 45 million in Invinity, another VRFB manufacturer, which allowed the company to access follow-on funding from the equity capital markets, establishing a leading VRFB player.”
According to Bushveld CEO Fortune Mojapelo, the company’s “investment in Enerox follows the same script of mobilising third-party financing to scale up manufacturing capacity and sales while establishing a platform for collaboration in developing projects into which we will supply vanadium.”
Adding:
“Investing in VRFB manufacturers is a part of Bushveld Energy's strategy, designed to play a catalytic role in mobilising third-party capital to assist VRFB manufacturers scale-up of sales and manufacturing capacity to meet the fast-growing demand for long-duration energy storage solutions.”
Bushveld recently sold a portion of its Invinity Energy Systems Plc’s holding for $8.8 million and clarified that the sale does not reflect its diminishing faith in Invinity’s potential.
Mojapelo clarified that the firm’s “decision is rather informed by our conservative capital allocation strategy across the group, which focuses resources on our mining and processing operations and seeks to place Bushveld Energy on a path to self-fund its plans.”
Bushveld Minerals share price.
Bushveld Minerals shares surged 13.33% to trade at 17.68p, having risen from Wednesday’s closing price of 15.6p.