Avantium reported higher consolidated revenues from operations in 2019, driven, said the company, mainly by increased systems sales by Avantium Catalysis. At €13.8 million, revenues were up 22% from €11.3 million in 2018. Total EBITDA decreased from €-9.5 million in 2018 to €-16.3 million in 2019.
In the Renewable Chemistries business, revenue arose from collaboration agreements with partners; in Avantium Renewable Polymers, revenue was generated by agreements allowing customers to validate the company’s technology.
Avantium recorded a net loss for 2019 of €23.5 million, compared to €68.4 million for 2018. The 2018 results were influenced by one-off expenses and impairment losses relating to the acquisition of Synvina, now renamed Avantium Renewable Polymers, amounting to approximately €50 million.
Avantium also pressed ahead with the implementation of its revised commercialisation strategy. Calling 2019 a ‘pivotal year’, CEO Tom van Aken said the company now had regained control over the scale- up and market-launch strategy of its YXY Technology to produce FDCA and PEF. This enabled, among others, plans to be made for Avantium Renewable Polymers’ 5 kilotonne -FDCA flagship plant to be located at Chemie Park Delfzijl in the Netherlands.
The company is currently working to ensure the necessary financing - approximately €150 million - is in place by the end of 2020, ‘at which point we would confirm our decision to proceed with the construction of the flagship plant,’ said van Aken.
The Renewable Chemistries business made ‘significant progress’ on its Ray Technology, Dawn Technology and the Volta platform in 2019. Avantium operates a demonstration plant for its Ray technology and a pilot refinery for its Daw technology units at Chemie Park Delfzijl. Volta is a platform technology that uses electrochemistry to convert CO2 to higher value products and chemical building blocks. In 2019, Avantium opened a pre-pilot test unit for the Volta technology at the Port of Amsterdam.
Next to the ongoing programmes in its Renewable Chemistries and Catalysis divisions, the company is also looking at new business areas.
For the R&D Services business of Avantium Catalysis, two promising areas are chemical recycling of plastics and adsorption testing.
The company has been involved in various projects over the past year on the development of high-throughput testing solutions to support recycling programmes. And under the umbrella of the four-year IMPRESS research programme, Avantium Catalysis has developed two different adsorption test units which will be applicable to a range of issues.