Ballard Power Systems

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Ballard Power Systems <tr><td colspan="2" style="text-align:center; padding:16px 0 16px 0;">Image:Ballard logo new.gif</td></tr>
Type	Public NASDAQ: BLDP, TSX: BLD
Founded	1979
Headquarters	Burnaby, BC <tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Key people</th><td>Ian A. Bourne, (Chairman), John Sheridan (President and CEO)</td></tr><tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Industry</th><td>Alternative energy</td></tr><tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Products</th><td>Fuel cells</td></tr><tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Revenue</th><td>$46.453 million USD (2005)<ref name="ar2005">2005 Annual Report. Retrieved on 2006-07-16.</ref></td></tr><tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Net income</th><td>($86.553 million) USD (2005)<ref name="ar2005" /></td></tr><tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Employees</th><td>600 (2005)<ref>"Ballard Streamlines Activities to Further Reduce Operating Expenses", Ballard Power Systems, 2005-09-22. Retrieved on 2006-07-16.</ref></td></tr><tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Slogan</th><td>Power to Change the World</td></tr><tr><th style="text-align:right; padding-right:0.75em;">Website</th><td>www.ballard.com</td></tr>

Ballard Power Systems (TSX: BLD, NASDAQ: BLDP), located in Burnaby, British Columbia -- a suburb of Vancouver -- is a company that designs, develops, and manufactures zero emission proton-exchange-membrane fuel cells.

Ballard Power Systems was originally founded as Ballard Research by Dr. Geoffrey Ballard. The company went public in 1993 on the Toronto Exchange, and in 1995, listed on NASDAQ.<ref>When was Ballard's IPO?. Retrieved on 2006-07-16.</ref>

Some of the work performed by Ballard has included commercialization of:

fuel cell engines for the transportation market
electric drives for both fuel cell and battery-powered electric vehicles
power conversion products for fuel cell generators
microturbines and other distributed generation technologies
fuel cell systems for markets such as portable power products and larger stationary generation products.

Ballard Power Systems's main objective is to develop fuel-cell technology. With a key attribute to reduce the harmful impact on the environment, this technology covers solutions for portable and stationary power generation. In comparison to the internal combustion engine, fuel-cell systems are a practical alternative, for example, in automobiles and buses. Ballard Power Systems has had its focus within the automobile market, fleet services, co-generation systems, and manfacturers of materials for the fuel-cell sector.