Jun 7 2006
Quickstep Holdings Limited has announced that its operating subsidiary, Quickstep Technologies Pty Ltd, has signed a formal collaboration agreement with the National Composite Center (NCC) in the United States for the establishment of the first demonstration centre for its composites manufacturing technology in North America.
The signing of the formal agreement follows the Letter of Intent signed between Quickstep and the NCC in April 2006, and represents another important step in the commercialisation of the Quickstep Process.
The collaboration agreement will lead to the establishment of a North American Quickstep Center of Excellence, which is scheduled to be fully operational by September 2006. This represents the third strategically located facility of its kind to be established by Quickstep in alliance with a major international partner in the global composites industry. The new demonstration centre will be established in Dayton, Ohio, the birthplace of the aircraft industry.
The 3-year collaboration agreement with the NCC defines how the two organisations will staff and manage the new Center, including pricing of customer-funded demonstration and prototype projects and proposed revenue-sharing from these projects. Under the agreement, Quickstep will commit resources (including cash and in-kind contributions) towards the operating costs of the Center, including a full-time trained engineer to support customers in evaluating the Quickstep Process and making prototypes. The project will also be partially funded by the State of Ohio and the City of Dayton.
The agreement also includes formalisation of the commercial terms for the NCC’s purchase of a Quickstep QS20 composites production machine. Quickstep has now received a formal purchase order (including the associated Prototype/Development Licence) for this equipment, to be located in Dayton, Ohio at the NCC. The commercial terms of this purchase order are confidential.
In addition to the QS20 machine already in operation at Quickstep’s headquarters in Perth, Western Australia, the Company has three QS5 machines in operation at VCAMM (Geelong, Victoria), in Japan and at the recently established European Quickstep Centre of Excellence in Manchester, UK. In addition to the new QS20 machine for the NCC, a further two QS20 machines are currently being built for the Company’s Flatout Boats business and its recently announced manufacturing venture in India.
http://www.quickstep.com.au and http://www.compositecenter.org