Research and development business Permo-Drive was listed for sale this week by administrators PKF Chartered Accountants.
Permo-Drive was established in 2000 and has developed an intellectual property that hydraulically captures kinetic energy in heavy vehicles to reduce operating costs.
The technology converts energy from braking into kinetic energy that saves on fuel, but it was never commercialised and Permo-Drive has never made a profit.
Permo-Drive is a public company with over 1,900 shareholders and is currently not listed on any exchange. Its head office and engineering centre is in Lismore in New South Wales.
The business collapsed on June 1 and administrator Atle Crowe-Maxwell told SmartCompany that Permo-Drive had simply run out of money.
“They ran out of money from continuing to try and commercialise the technology in a market where it is difficult to try and raise capital. Things like this go well in times when people have got a little bit of capital to tie up in something that is not core business for them, but at the moment people are not in the mind to put additional money in that,” Crowe-Maxwell said.
“It has pretty much existed on contributions from shareholders, grants and rebates from the government and the tax office.
“Credit is hard to get and investors are hard to find at the moment.”
PKF advertised the sale of the business in newspapers on Tuesday, called for expressions of interest and prepared an information memorandum.
Crowe-Mawell says Permo-Drive did not employ any staff currently and had not traded for a while.
“At the moment, we don’t know what it is worth as it is partially completed technology, so we are looking for guidance from the market as to what someone is prepared to pay,” he said.
PKF is offering the group’s entities, businesses and intellectual property in its entirety for sale or alternatively the group’s intellectual property individually.
Crowe-Maxwell says so far he has received “three or four” phone calls requesting copies of the information memorandum and offers for the business must be made by June 22.
The administration and sale of the company follows record number of business collapses recently.
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