Good morning. Thank you for attending the Aspen Aerogels, Inc. Q3 2022 financial results call. All lines will be muted during the presentation portion of the call with an opportunity for questions and answers at the end. I'd now like to turn the conference over to your host, Laura Guerrant, Aspen's Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Thank you. You may proceed, Ms. Guerrant.
Thank you, Emily. Good morning, and thank you for joining us for the Aspen Aerogels Fiscal Year 2022 third quarter financial results conference call. With us today are Donald Young, President and CEO, and Ricardo Rodriguez, Chief Financial Officer. There are a few housekeeping items that I would like to address before turning the call over to Don.
The press release announcing Aspen's financial results and business developments, as well as a reconciliation of management's use of non-GAAP financial measures compared to the most applicable U.S. generally accepted accounting principles or GAAP measures, is available on the investors section of Aspen's website, www.aerogel.com. Including in the press release is a summary statement of operations, a summary balance sheet, and a summary of key financial and operating statistics for the 2022 third quarter ended September 30, 2022.
In addition, I'd like to highlight that we have uploaded to our website a slide deck that will accompany our conversation today. You can find the deck at the investors section of our website. An archive of today's webcast will be on our website for approximately one year.
Please note that our discussion today will include forward-looking statements, including any statement regarding outlook, expectations, beliefs, projections, estimates, targets, prospects, business plans, and any other statement that is not a historical fact. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties. Aspen Aerogels' actual results may differ materially from those expressed in these forward-looking statements.
A list of factors that could affect the company's actual results can be found in Aspen's press release issued yesterday, page one of the presentation, and are discussed in more detail on the reports Aspen files with the SEC, particularly the company's most recent annual report on Form 10-Q. The company's press release issued yesterday and filings with the SEC can also be found on the investors section of Aspen's website.
Forward-looking statements made today represent the company's views as of today, October 27, 2022. Aspen Aerogels disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances. During this call, we will refer to non-GAAP financial measures, including Adjusted EBITDA. These financial measures are not prepared in accordance with GAAP. These non-GAAP financial measures are not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for results prepared in accordance with GAAP.
The definitions and reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures and a discussion of why we present these non-GAAP financial measures are included in yesterday's press release. One final note during the Q&A session. In the interest of time, we ask that you limit your questions to two questions at a time. If you have additional questions beyond the initial two, please get back into the queue, and we will get to all questions. I'll now turn the call over to Don. Don?
Thanks, Laura. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us for our Q3 2022 earnings call. I will kick things off with a progress report on our recent business developments and financing activities, and Ricardo will discuss business results and outlook. We will conclude with a Q&A session. Our first revenue guidance for 2022 had a center point of $150 million.
At the time, we reiterated our 2023 target to double revenue from 2021 to 2023 to $240 million and to triple revenue from 2023 to 2025 to over $700 million. During the second quarter, we raised our revenue guidance to a center point of $190 million while maintaining our 2023 and 2025 revenue targets.
At our last earnings call, we anticipated that automotive OEMs would be impacted from time to time by supply chain challenges that could influence their growth ramps in any given period. We saw this in the third quarter, and while we had record thermal barrier revenue, it was less than we expected at the outset of the quarter.
Q3 revenue was also impacted by some of our own supply chain issues, which Ricardo will cover in his presentation. We are experiencing during the second half of this year the fluctuations inherent in the startup nature of the EV market as our OEMs ramp their EV production.
We believe that our Q4 thermal barrier revenue will be at a record level of approximately $20 million and will enable us to achieve overall revenue for the year of approximately $180 million, revenue growth for the year of nearly 50%. Our PyroThin thermal barrier commercial activity continues to gather pace as we deepen our engagement with additional customers.
We continue to sell parts to support customer product development and our long-term revenue pipeline, most notably to the commercial vehicle division of an important German EV OEM and one of its luxury light vehicle brands. Increasing the number of vehicle nameplates to which we supply production parts is key. While we will continue to anticipate variability from one quarter to the next during the ramping period, overall, we believe that the long-term EV momentum is powerful.
We remain confident that we have ample opportunity to reach our 2023 revenue target of $240 million and our 2025 revenue target of $720 million. We have a deep order book on the energy and industrial side of our business, and while it can mitigate some of the variability of the EV OEM ramp, it is not a one-for-one replacement at the revenue level.
There are several highlights from the energy and industrial business. We continue to see strong growth in LNG markets. During Q3, we had several early wins and accelerated LNG projects that will unfold in the coming quarters and years. In North America, we had first shipments of product for the conversion of former drilling rigs to rapid deployment LNG assets.
We received additional orders in Latin America for Peru LNG and expect continued growth in Latin America as projects on the Pacific take shape. We are expanding our presence in the Middle East and are proud to partner with ADNOC LNG, where we received our first Cryogel award in Q3. In the U.S., we saw strong demand and serviced large turnarounds through the quarter on the refinery and petrochemical side of the business.
We completed major construction and material support for Shell's Pennsylvania Chemical facility. We also continued during Q3 to execute on the largest propylene oxide plant in the world for LyondellBasell. The value drivers for these wins are long-term asset protection and simplified logistics. We are seeing similarly high activity levels in Europe, Asia, and in Canada. One last note on energy industrial.
Our SpaceLoft subsea pipe-in-pipe segment is strong with 5 recent awards from Subsea 7, TechnipFMC, and Allseas. These five projects represent approximately $12.7 million in revenue, and our backlog in this space continues to grow. The strong outlook for energy industrial is fueled by our value drivers of efficiency, resiliency, and safety.
We are building in optionality to manage our overall revenue growth during this early stage of the EV megatrend. This flexibility is a good example of the benefit of our strategy to leverage the aerogel technology platform into a diverse set of large and dynamic markets. With an active energy industrial business and with a strong position to grow with the EV megatrend, we are committed to our $240 million 2023 revenue target and our $720 million 2025 revenue target.
We continue to make progress on Plant Two, our aerogel manufacturing facility under construction in Georgia. At a macro level, the past 12 months have been marked by supply chain, inflationary, and cost of capital challenges for all projects, and our Plant Two project has not been immune.
We are proactively managing the project in order to mitigate cost and schedule pressures, and doing so without losing sight of our goal to build the initial phase of the first-class aerogel manufacturing facility that enables us to hit our 2025 revenue target of $720 million. We have also designed Plant Two to allow us to bring online incremental capacity as our current OEM scale and as we are able to convert a robust development and prototyping pipeline into design awards with new OEMs.
We believe Plant Two positions us to play a significant and important role in battery performance and safety. As we have said in the past, as is especially true in the current financial markets, we are taking an all-of-the-above approach to financing our growth plan.
As we explore prospective sources of capital, we have continued to focus on strategic investors who know our company and the markets we serve and who have the potential to make equity or debt investments in the business, as Koch Strategic Platforms has done in the past and has indicated its interest in doing so again. We believe having a strategic investor as the centerpiece of an investor group will add validation to our business strategy and, of course, strengthen our balance sheet.
While market conditions continue to be a challenge, we believe we will close a round of financing in the near term. In addition to potential strategic investors and the public equity and debt markets, we are engaged with government programs as potential 2023 sources of capital for Plant Two.
Our first application for the U.S. Department of Energy Grant for Advanced Battery Materials as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act was not funded, as we believe the awards were largely granted to companies that are, quote, "inside the cell." We believe that the administration is likely to announce an additional $3 billion in grant funding opportunities before the end of second quarter 2023. We expect that a significant amount of that funding will be dedicated to U.S.-based manufacturers dedicated to the electrification economy.
We are also exploring other DOE programs that are focused on battery performance and safety. The programs target American manufacturing in an effort to address the resiliency of supply chains in the U.S., especially for projects in critical areas of sustainability, such as energy storage and related materials.
While such DOE programs can take time and are unpredictable, we believe we are a very good candidate and that our pursuit is consistent with our all-of-the-above approach to raising the necessary capital for us to execute our long-term strategy. Finally, I would like to continue the practice of highlighting our ESG work during quarterly earnings calls. For the past two decades, sustainability has been linked to the success of our business.
It is a natural fit for us to explore new uses for our aerogel technology platform with the goal of improving environmental performance and safety of our customers' products and processes. It is also at the core of our culture to respect and celebrate our employees by striving to create a diverse and inclusive environment.
We believe we have a responsibility to make a positive impact on our communities, and we are committed to creating a corporate culture that pursues its mission with the highest standards of integrity. During the third quarter, Aspen published our inaugural ESG highlights report and launched our ESG webpage, which provide a comprehensive overview of our overall ESG strategy. We look forward to your feedback. I will now turn the call over to Ricardo Rodriguez.
Thank you, Don. I'll start on slide four and our financial highlights for the third quarter. Starting with revenues. We delivered $36.7 million of revenues in Q3, which translates into 21% growth year-over-year. Energy industrial demand remains very strong, and we're booking orders into the second half of next year. We see no demand risk in the medium- to long-term on our EV thermal barriers as the move to electrification accelerates.
Our annual Aerogel Plant Shutdown to implement longer roll lengths and faster line speeds, combined with CO2 shortages and near-term volume ramp-up delays in EV thermal barrier part demand, prevented us from continuing the recent quarterly revenue growth rate that we've been driving for three quarters in a row. Absent these disruptions, we believe revenue would have increased by $7 million.
Our EV thermal barrier revenues increased by 11% over the prior quarter to $11.9 million and over 12-fold year-over-year. Our Q3 energy industrial revenues of $24.7 million were 16% lower than those in the same quarter last year and 29% lower than in the previous quarter. This segment was most affected by our prescheduled annual plant shutdown and the national CO2 shortage.
To illustrate this impact, it's worth remembering that our aerogel plant in Rhode Island operates 24/7. We effectively shut down this operation for seven days from July 16th to July 22nd and implemented various process changes that are already yielding benefits with faster line speeds and longer roll production lengths. The national CO2 shortage prevented us from realizing these benefits in the third quarter by limiting our aerogel production for at least 17 days.
We've implemented various measures to ensure that we reduce the frequency and impact of further interruptions by increasing our CO2 storage capacity on site and starting to manage the transportation of supply with our own trailers. These investments have already contributed to a stable production schedule this month. Next, I'll provide a summary of our main expenses.
Material expenses of $20.8 million for the quarter made up 57 percentage points of sales, which continue to be over 10 percentage points higher than where we want these to be in the long term. This delta is driven by the fact that most of our EV thermal barrier production in July was still delivered from Rhode Island with higher scrap levels and a more complex part design that has been phased out as we transition to higher volumes.
In Q3, we effectively transferred our EV thermal barrier assembly from Rhode Island to a larger site in Monterrey, Mexico, with higher volume processes that will enable our profitable growth in the future. As we completed this initiative at the beginning of August, demand on the three automotive nameplates that we're currently supplying temporarily slowed as customers are addressing their own issues, increasing vehicle production volumes.
This slowdown prevented our thermal barrier gross margins from improving quarter-over-quarter, ending at -70% versus -67% in the prior quarter by affecting our ability to absorb fixed costs. We are confident, however, that as soon as demand accelerates next year, we will be able to capitalize on the transition to optimized processes.
Conversion costs, which we consistently describe as all production costs required to convert raw materials into finished goods, were $22.8 million and made up 61 percentage points of sales. These costs include all elements of direct labor, manufacturing overhead, factory supplies, rent, insurance, utilities, overhead, and inspection.
With less revenue than expected during the quarter and approximately $12.9 million of these expenses being fixed, it was challenging to continue our path towards reducing these as a percentage of sales through improved fixed cost absorption. However, we remain confident in our ability to leverage the higher throughput rates enabled by faster line speeds and longer aerogel roll lengths to manage these costs. Operating expenses, which are key to delivering our revenue and profitability goals of 2023 and beyond, were $22 million.
These increased by half a million dollars quarter-over-quarter versus an increase of $4.6 million in Q2 over the prior quarter. This modest increase aligns with my remarks from Q2 around making sure that our OpEx increases become more modest and focused precisely on delivering three things. One, tangible productivity benefits through new process development and the implementation of systems that streamline our methods and drive overall productivity.
Two, new business awards through our EV thermal barrier technical sales efforts. And lastly, clear milestones in our R&D efforts. These include our silicon anode carbon aerogel development efforts, along with R&D efforts in our silica aerogel-based insulation formulations.
These are the developments that drive lower chemical waste expenses through reformulation and enable further productivity improvements. Accordingly, our net loss increased to $29.6 million or $0.75 per share, versus a net loss of $7.8 million or $0.24 per share in the same quarter of 2021. Adjusted EBITDA was -$23.2 million in Q3, compared to -$7.8 million in Q3 of last year.
As a reminder, we define adjusted EBITDA as net income or loss before interest, taxes, depreciation, amortization, stock-based compensation expenses, and other items that we do not believe are indicative of our core operating performance. In Q3, these other items included $2.6 million of stock-based compensation and $1.3 milli on of interest expense.
Next, I'll turn to cash flow and our balance sheet. Cash used in operations of $37.4 million reflected our Adjusted EBITDA of -$28.3 million and an increase in operational cash needs of $14.3 million that reflects a quarterly decrease in accounts payable of $15.5 million.
Capital expenditures during the quarter of $67 million included the site work, extractor pit formation as part of Plant Two's construction, assembly equipment for a higher volume thermal barrier operations, the R&D lab upgrades for our carbon aerogel battery material efforts, and the initial construction of our Advanced Thermal Barrier Center. As progress remains on track for Plant Two to enable our revenue growth in 2024, we have incurred $129.4 million in capital expenses through the end of Q3 towards it.
Cash provided by financing activities of $44.7 million during Q3 included $44.9 million of net proceeds from our ATM offering transactions at a gross average price of $10.63 per share. We ended the quarter with $102.4 million of cash, no borrowings under our revolving credit facility, and shareholders' equity of $182.4 million. We remain geared to deliver revenues of $180 million in 2022, a net loss in the range of $82.3 million-$86.8 million, and Adjusted EBITDA in the range of -$57.5 million-$62 million.
Our capital expenditures for the year are expected to range between $200 million and $255 million as we work to further optimize our commitments and investments across the board. Delivering over $59 million of revenues during the fourth quarter is subject to various external factors, such as our thermal barriers customers' abilities to maintain their stated vehicle production volumes.
And the supply chain of our main raw materials such as silanes, batting, CO2, and the local labor market, particularly for our aerogel facility in Rhode Island. We are proactively managing our supply chain risks and have ensured that we're supplied silanes and batting to execute our production plans. Recent nationwide CO2 shortages and a tight labor market continue to pose the highest near-term risks to our revenue ramp.
Before turning the call back to Don, I'd like to provide a brief commercial activities update on slide six. In this chart, to remind everyone, the size of the circle is the vehicle volume in millions that Piper Sandler is forecasting for these OEMs in 2025, and their placement on the map is their approximate headquarters location.
The color of the circle then determines whether we have been awarded business by that OEM, are actively quoting business, undergoing testing, or not active with that OEM. We presented an earlier version of this slide during our Q2 earnings call. You can see that our team has successfully entered the quoting stages with the largest customers in Europe and Asia that will be relevant on a global basis in 2025.
The volume of prototyping activity in Europe has also advanced into deep technical development that reinforces our strategy and continues to demonstrate customers' eagerness to invest in the right thermal runaway and thermal propagation solution. In Q3, we also started discussions with an additional American OEM and have provided them with PyroThin materials to test its capabilities. With that, I'm happy to turn the call back to Don.
Thank you, Ricardo. Before we turn to the Q&A session, I would like to reiterate two important points. First, both our EV and energy industrial businesses provide a favorable backdrop for us to reach our 2023 and 2025 revenue targets. Second, despite the challenging financial markets, we are confident that we will fund our plan to execute our strategy, we'll become cash flow positive during 2024, and create value for our shareholders. We appreciate your continued support. Emily, let's turn to the Q&A session.
Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please do so now by pressing star followed by 1 on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind and would like to be removed from the queue, please press star followed by 2. When preparing to ask your question, please ensure that your microphone is unmuted locally. Our first question today comes from the line of Eric Stine with Craig-Hallum. Eric, your line is open.
Hi, Don. Hi, Ricardo.
Eric, how are you?
Hey. How's it going?
Doing well, thanks. I'd love to just stick with slide five. I mean, first of all, great to see that, you know, you've added Tesla, and I mean, that seems to be pretty recent since it looks like it's been updated over the last month. I'm curious, you know, you've had these blue circles and you're in quoting stage.
I mean, is this an area where it's kind of going as expected and that you've got the OEMs, you know, now really trying to dial in what their plans are for their platform for specific launches, launch dates, that sort of thing? You know, just maybe thoughts on that, and do you have an expectation of when you think you could see some movement of those moving from quote stage to actual awards?
Sure, Eric. Maybe before answering that one, I'll just make a quick correction on my remarks around the CapEx range. I actually meant to say that our CapEx range is going to be between $200 million and $225 million, which I believe there in the pressure of the moment, I read it as $255 on the higher end.
Now, to answer your question on our progress in Europe, yeah, I mean, for us, really what is evidence of progress there and getting closer to actually being sourced is the level of prototyping activity and the volume of parts and the iteration of those designs that are worked through with the teams. That's why we put that in Don's remarks because it is notable.
I mean, that volume of prototype parts that we've sent in Europe has increased, and we've got a clearer line of sight to what the specific applications we were being eyed for. I think that'll continue making progress, and next year we're going to start seeing that convert into a potential award.
Eric, I would just add to what Ricardo said. The pattern of engagement with these European OEMs and the intensity of it and the sort of specifics of the prototype tweaks, if you will, remind us very much of where we were with our earlier award wins with General Motors and Toyota. I think it is also a function of those companies in the development of their battery platforms and the various nameplates that they have. We recognize this pattern quite clearly, and that gives us confidence that we're in a good position with several of them.
Got it. I mean, fair to say that it sounds like with the one German OEM that you called out in the presentation, I mean, confidence there, but potentially 2023 is when you see, you know, others, whether it's Europe or Asia or, I mean, could be North America as well.
Absolutely.
Mm-hmm.
Okay. Maybe second one for me, you know, you may be limited as to what you can say, and understandable if that's the case, but you know, as I think about all these circles on the map and how that plays into financing, I mean, clearly a strategic and you know, you seem to have a lot of confidence in going down that road. You know, any clarity you can provide? You know, do you think it would be potentially from this map on this slide or you know, someone in the more broad insulation space?
We'd just like to be careful answering that, Eric. Let's just say sort of all of the above, if we can, just to use a phrase that we've used before.
Sure.
Not to be evasive.
Sure, sure.
I just wanna be careful in this stage of engagement.
Nope, understandable, but thought I would give it a shot anyway. Okay. Thank you.
Appreciate it. Yeah. Thanks so much.
Our next question comes from Colin Rusch with Oppenheimer. Please go ahead, Colin.
Thanks so much, guys. You know, with the full year guidance, it looks like you're gonna get to about $60 million in revenue for the year. I just wanna understand where that incremental revenue is coming from. You know, if all of that's coming from the EV space, and assume that the larger bulk of that is gonna be coming from the industrial space, and how much visibility you have to those numbers right now.
Yeah. I think the volumes on the EV thermal barrier side have become clearer for Q4 just recently. As Don mentioned in his remarks, I think we've got a relatively clear line of sight to around $20 million for the EV thermal barrier space. Then really we're leaning heavily on really the products that we have the highest productivity on out of the aerogel facility to really deliver the rest, the other $40 million here. I mean, the backlog is really strong there and we've got customers there eager and expecting the product.
As we were working our way through the end of Q3, we started allocating Aerogel P roduction to the energy industrial segment, and we've continued to do that and that's what still gives us confidence into $180 million for the year in 2022.
I think as Ricardo said in his script, we're taking orders into 2023 at this point on the energy industrial side. For us, it comes down to avoiding any supply chain issues during Q4. As Ricardo also said in his remarks, we've made significant improvements not only with productivity, but around some of our raw materials in particular, CO2, which has been challenging nationally for a period. We've put in place some belt and suspenders efforts to be sure that we don't have disruptions going forward.
Okay. That's super helpful, guys. Then just thinking about the gross margin evolution here, you know, with those supply chain adjustments and some of the cost out measures that you've got, how should we be thinking about the cadence of gross margin improvement as we get through the balance of this year, which you guys have provided a fair amount of detail on, but more importantly into next year?
Yeah. I mean, it's heavily volume dependent on the EV thermal barrier side. We still, I mean, we're still not deviating from our plans to turn that positive next year. If here, as we work to deliver the $20 million in Q4, I think we're gonna see a very good improvement over Q3 and Q2, just given the nature of what these parts look like now and really the processes that we're using to make them. We're really pushing hard to turn that positive as soon as possible, and I feel confident that as we deliver the $20 million, that gives us enough of a revenue base to demonstrate that path.
Okay, great. Thanks, guys.
Okay, great. Thank you, Colin.
Our next question today comes from Alex Potter with Piper Sandler. Please go ahead, Alex.
Great. Thanks. So Ricardo, my first question is on the revised CapEx guide, $200 million-$225 million, which is down versus last quarter. I'm just wondering if you can give some color on what qualitatively has changed. What are you delaying CapEx? Are you finding areas of increased efficiency? What's the main driver of that downward adjustment?
Sure. It's really just more timing versus our estimates at the beginning of the year, and then in June as we were looking at it. While the progress hasn't slowed, it's really. It ultimately comes down to when these expenses actually hit our books, and they're hitting us slower than we were originally expecting as we were planning for the year, and then obviously working through our capital raise efforts. At the same time, when it comes to all of the other projects, we're really scrutinizing the scope of every single thing to not over-commit here. That has given us some efficiency, but it's not the bulk of the retiming here.
Okay. That's helpful. Then I guess maybe also just on sources of incremental capital. I can appreciate the sensitivity around this topic. It appears obviously to be a very material topic. If you look at the guidance for CapEx as well as your cash balance as it currently exists, I'm wondering the extent to which you have access to capital. I can't remember how much is left on the ATM. You know, is a big capital raise necessary in the next 3-6 months in order for you to continue on your path with this CapEx guidance, or is it not necessary?
Alex, it's Don. We anticipate, we believe that we will have a capital raise in the near term and to support our Plant Two and some of the other activities that we have going on that require capital and to stay on course to execute on our strategy. I think having a strong balance sheet is also important to some of the automotive OEMs who are looking to us to have parts designed into their platforms over a long period of time.
There are several good reasons for us to fortify the $100 and some million dollars that we started this quarter with. We intend to do that. Again, we believe we'll do it in the near term. With respect to the ATM, do you have that?
We've got around $60 million.
Remaining on that, Alex. Yeah.
We're being cautious and opportunistic on how we use that. It's obviously not the main source of capital here.
Yeah.
Okay, great. Maybe if I can squeeze one last one in here. Can you talk about this CO2 shortage? This is the first time I had heard of it. I'm not really steeped in that supply chain, so any additional color you can give on that. It sounds like you are taking some mitigating factors in order to address that.
But to what extent could something like this resurface next quarter or two quarters from now? Obviously, it seems like this sort of crept up out of nowhere. So how big of a risk is this or other parts of the supply chain in that energy and industrial part of the business? Thanks.
Yeah, I mean, the CO2 shortage hasn't really gone away. It's actually been in the news quite a bit over the summer with folks in the beverage space not being able to get it, dry ice suppliers not being able to get it. It started here in the Northeast as we understand it, and basically spread throughout the country, and it's still there. What we've had to do is really just increase the amount of buffer that we have of it on site and then really take control over how we get it from anywhere in the country, rather than relying on, you know, more of a regional supply chain. For us, it really didn't come out of nowhere.
We've been flagging it as a risk really since Q1 and started installing the additional capacity for storage on site. More structurally, there's an opportunity to invest in actually doing our own recapturing. As we understand the national issue, it really all stemmed from a contamination issue for one of the main sources in the U.S. that really prevented.
You know all of us who are heavy users of CO2 to get it on a timely manner. I mean, it's alleviated just given that the demand is dropping in the fall, but we've also just been able to put in place the right mitigation actions so that we're less affected by it. For us in Q3 particularly, the issue was the timing, right? Ideally, this would have been timed exactly when we shut down the plant for our improvements. Really the bulk of the down days came after we restarted the plant ready to make more aerogel.
Just one last comment. As we did site selection, Alex, for our Plant Two, the Southeast has a much greater, much more robust sources of CO2 supply. We recycle the vast percentage of our CO2 use, and we continue to improve upon that. As Ricardo alluded to, I think in the future, as we continue to sort of pull our supply chain a little closer in, we have opportunities to self-generate as well. We've been focused on this for a while.
This has been an issue, a potential issue, for a while, and obviously it came out in full force in the third quarter. I think our team is doing a lot, going at it from a lot of different directions. Again, as I say, the Southeast where our plant number two is again has a much more robust set of suppliers.
That's super helpful, guys. Thanks. I'll pass it on.
Thanks, Alex.
Our next question comes from Chris Souther with B. Riley. Chris, please go ahead.
Hey, thanks for taking my call. Maybe just to start, we could talk about, you know, you mentioned near-term capital raise from strategic potentially another round with Koch and the ATM. I just wanted to get a sense, you know, if there's an additional DOE loan, you know, for kinda 2023.
Are we still looking at $150 million for that potentially next year? You know, maybe as you're sizing other investments between now and then, you know, just how we should think about you guys baking in the DOE loan as part of the puzzle if you need the cash kind of ahead of when that approval might come in.
Yeah. Let me just comment on our work with DOE. As I said in my script, there was a set of awards that took place a couple of weeks ago. We were not included in that. Many of the companies who were were in the battery chemistry, sort of as I said, sort of inside the cell. We anticipate that in Q2 of 2023 there will be a second set of awards. Again, as we understand it, in the range of about $3 billion. There will be a greater focus on manufacturing. Our grant application was specific to our Plant Two activities.
We believe we're a good candidate for that in support of electrification and some of the themes that are inherent in that program. We are very focused on presenting well, if you will, to in that effort. Although, Chris, it is hard to count on it. We're taking an approach to be sure that I don't wanna call it a nice to have, but we are taking an approach to be sure we have the adequate capital to continue to execute our strategy throughout 2023 of building that facility and bringing plant two up online so it's contributing in the beginning of 2024 to support our growth in that year.
In terms of other capital. Yeah. We'll continue. We're very focused, again, not to overuse the all of the above phrase, but we will be focused on strategic investors. Koch has been a terrific supporter of ours, and we believe they will continue to be. The equity and debt markets as well. Again, we're taking a pretty broad view of this. We believe that we will be able to close a round of financing here in the near term. We'll continue to work the capitalization of our company to keep up with the enormous opportunity that we have in front of us.
Got it. Okay. Yeah, all that makes sense. I think you had called out the grant you were applying for on this last round that was announced, you know, a week or two ago, that it was $150 million. Now, is that kind of in the ballpark of what you'd be applying for in that-
Mm-hmm. Right. Correct. Yeah
.....upcoming kind of more of a thing? Okay. Got it. Cool.
Correct. Yeah. Thanks.
Maybe just on Toyota. You know, there have been multiple press releases over the past week or so talking about Toyota reviewing their overall EV roadmap, potentially transitioning, you know, with larger volumes around 2025, and the bZ4X maybe being a bigger piece of that 2025 plans.
Can we just get a sense, you know, maybe mashing up some of those press reports we're seeing with what you guys have baked in for 2025 from that customer? I'm curious if, you know, you guys are reading the same things and, you know, thinking that the volumes you have talked about, you know, having visibility for might have upside. You know, anything you could kinda comment around, you know, progress with that customer around just kinda the, you know, the platform going beyond bZ4X I think would be helpful for folks.
Well, coincidentally, we have a team in Japan this week actually and visiting with Toyota among others. Of course we've read some of the same dispatches that you're referring to. I think what I would just say is that we are engaged technically and commercially with Toyota and remain close to them. It will be. I don't mean to say we're privy to anything that is
Yeah, that goes beyond the headline.
Goes beyond the headline. I think when you boil it all down, I think the headlines were really yes, maybe a shift, but I think a shift to you know go bigger and be yet more committed to it.
Also to answer your question on just how that factors into our 2025 revenue plan, right now we're really only including the nameplate that we have been awarded.
Yeah.
Got it. Yeah. Okay. Thanks, guys.
Thanks, Chris.
Our next question comes from Jeff Osborne with TD Cowen. Please go ahead, Jeff.
Yeah. Good morning. Two quick questions, Don. One, I think in the past you had talked about, you know, maybe challenges in using your PyroThin product for cylindrical format batteries. I was just curious if that's still the case or if you've found an application that might work for that?
That's still the case.
Yeah, it, yeah.
Is there anything to do?
Sorry, go ahead.
....to better sell the cell more at the pack level or no?
Yeah. I mean, for folks that are using prismatic and pouch cells. I mean, this whole idea of the form factor is something that we're seeing everybody reconsidering right now, along with chemistries. We're definitely more compatible with folks that are using prismatic and pouch cells.
I think speaking
Got it.
....generally, Jeff, without meaning to speak to any one OEM, I think we also see, as Ricardo mentions, companies working on different chemistries and sometimes form factors to go along with those chemistries, perhaps LFP chemistries, et cetera. It's interesting to be engaged in some of those programs, again, on the prismatic and pouch side of that where our strengths lie.
Got it. Just to be clear, 'cause you've seen GM also announce stationary batteries. Are you in conversations around stationary batteries? If so, is that included in chart, slide five, I think it is, that references, you know, your dialogue with potential customers, or is that just specifically for automobiles in 2025?
Slide five only refers to particularly light vehicle volumes. As we understand, the stationary batteries that you mentioned are also on the Ultium platform using Ultium modules, and we are in the Ultium modules.
Got it. Then just the last question I had that's helpful, Ricardo, is you mentioned several times the shutdown in July and the, you know, speeding up, as well as the elongation of the rolls. Can you quantify, you know, what the potential either margin impact is of that exercise or the potential annual revenue impact or percentage-
Yeah.
....throughput increase. Is there any way to frame that?
All else being equal, and uninterrupted, you know, without any changes in product mix, that's around a 20% productivity improvement, just additional throughput with the same fixed expenses.
That's great to hear. That's all I had. Thank you.
Yes. Thank you, Jeff.
Our next question comes from George Gianarikas with Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead, George.
Hi, good morning, and thanks for taking my questions. I'd like to ask about Toyota, again, because...
Hi, George.
Hi, good morning. Some of the articles referenced a complete redesign of their thermal management, and I'm just kinda curious as to whether you could share any thoughts on what you know about what they're considering there. Thank you.
Yeah. It's hard to go into a ton of detail there, unfortunately. Not to evade it, but really we just don't wanna front the news here.
George, I would just say that there, you know, that Toyota has an important focus on thermal management as I think some of the articles have said and have—as they've had in the past. I think the fact that they have included that in their redesign kinda concepts, I think is interesting.
It's worth mentioning that the overall trend.
And then I... Is this-
It's more.
Yeah
Right? More of it. More and better. Yeah, I think.
Understood.
Yeah, I think that would be.
I wanna focus on a previous question as well.
Mm-hmm
around the energy, the stationary storage opportunity. I mean, how many conversations have you had with regards to that market? Can you share, any details about how that might be a future opportunity beyond, I don't know, 25 or 26?
Well, with respect to, we've had across the industry conversations on this. General Motors, of course, made their announcement more recently in this regard, and they have stated that they are using their Ultium battery platform as the basis for the stationary energy storage. We're, you know, sort of literally and figuratively in the middle of that. That is a positive for us as they build that out. We have been engaged with them around Ultium, and our focus, of course, has been on the EV side of the business to date.
Again, we don't have any extra insights that we'd be able to share at this point on their strategy. Of course other companies have worked in this direction also, and we've been engaged with them. A lot of the same ideas of mitigating the dangers of thermal runaway certainly apply in this case as they do in an EV.
Thank you.
Thank you, George.
Our next question comes from Tom Curran with Seaport Research Partners. Please go ahead, Tom.
Good morning.
Morning, Tom.
Not much left on my list. With this imminent round of financing done, would the expectation still be, number one, that it's most likely to be structured as some type of PIPE? Number two, that it will probably include two strategic investors?
The PIPE option is certainly a you know falls under the umbrella of all of the above for certain. It would be an interesting approach to us. I think the idea of multiple strategics. We were not necessarily including Koch in that phraseology, even though one could very much make the argument that it's a strategic in many regards. As a partner, they've been extremely helpful to us. I think that's. I'll just leave it there, if I may. We believe we anticipate that this will play out here in the near term.
Fair enough. I understand, you know, things are very sensitive and constrained at the moment, but just that clarification. I was including KSP in, you know, asking about more than one strategic-
Yeah.
You've partly answered that. Then-
Yeah. No, I'm glad you, I believe you clarified that.
Right. And then Ricardo, for conversion costs, I believe you said, for thermal barriers, conversion costs came in for 3Q at 61% of sales. Looking to 4Q of 2023, if you should hit your thermal barriers gross margin target for 4Q, where would you expect conversion costs as a percentage of thermal barrier revenue to be at that point? Could you just revisit and expound upon what the drivers should be of that expected reduction in conversion costs as a percentage of thermal barriers revenue?
Yeah. They need to basically be cut in half, so they need to be in that 25%-30% level.
All 4 Q of next year.
Correct.
Go ahead. I just want you to.
Yeah. A good portion of that improvement comes through just the volume rate that I would be assuming as I do the math for that quarter. But really it kind of is a shame that we didn't have the thermal barrier volumes that we were expecting in August and September during the quarter, because we would have already started showing a path towards that through our operation in Mexico. We're hoping to really work now here in Q4 as we deliver roughly $20 million of thermal barrier revenues to start making a meaningful dent at that 61%. Ideally, a year from next quarter, we'll have cut that in half at least.
Great. We should see that first significant step down in conversion costs as a percentage of revenue starting with next quarter's results?
Correct. Assuming the volumes are there.
Great. Thank you.
Thanks.
Thank you, Tom.
Our next question comes from Chip Moore with EF Hutton. Please go ahead.
Thanks for taking the question. Just wanted to follow up there on the gross margin ramp in Q4. I think, you know, guidance implies you're somewhere closer to where you were back in 2019, and you just touched on the move to Monterrey for Pyrogel, so thanks for that. I guess maybe on subsea, should we be expecting the bulk of those orders you called out to hit in Q4 or any other factors to consider there?
Some of that activity will be produced and delivered during Q4. The majority of it will be in 2023.
Got it. Okay. Just to follow up, maybe you can give us a bit of a more of an update on advanced battery materials. You know, a lot of that DOE money announced last week is going to projects in that space, as you know. Just curious maybe how you're prioritizing investment there. Is this something you sort of wait until you get that next round of financing to accelerate, or how should we think about that?
Yeah, I mean, we haven't slowed down that development and actually have seen really encouraging results on those three metrics that we outlined earlier in the year. The team is just really impressive as we've built it up.
They're working in a brand-new lab, and we feel just as confident as we were a quarter ago or even two around our path to get there and have made meaningful progress towards demonstrating the increased energy density, the increased dependability on that higher density path towards a lower cost process than a lot of what we're seeing getting awarded here. Also reduce variability as you put the material into actually making a cell.
Really the team is still on a path towards demonstrating all of those things here before the end of the year. As we do that, we think about applying for a grant. I think emphasizing on those developments will be really important to improve our candidacy for these things as we focus on our inside the cell efforts more meaningfully after having demonstrated all of these milestones.
We're also able, reducing variability, really focused on cycle life as well, and the ability now to begin to produce enough quantity for larger scale testing, both internally, if you will, and with potential partners.
Good to hear. All right. I'll hop out. Thanks.
Thanks so much.
Okay.
We have no further questions today. Don, I will hand back to you for concluding remarks.
Thank you, Emily. We appreciate your interest in Aspen Aerogels and look forward to reporting to you our fourth quarter 2022 results in February. Be well, and have a good day. Thank you so much.
Thank you everyone for joining us today. This concludes our call. You may now disconnect your line.