The Quantaray Super Z is here! No, it's not the crystal formulation from Antares 7 that Captain Kirk has to insert into the fusion chamber or the ship will blow. It is the brandname of rechargeable nickel-zinc battery that Ritz Camera has begun to carry. The battery is made by PowerGenix. The batteries fit into standard AA battery slots. However, the batteries pack more charge than most existing rechargeable AA batteries so consumers should get brighter flashes and more shots per charge. The company is also trying to get other retailers or battery makers to release PowerGenix batteries under different brand names. Thomas Edison tried to perfect rechargeable zinc batteries several decades ago. Zinc batteries, however, historically only lasted a few recharges. PowerGenix has tinkered with the formula to make them commercially viable. The company also makes batteries for power tools and will aim at putting its batteries into plug-in cars. Dan Squiller, CEO of PowerGenix, talked about his technology in a video recently. It's a zinc renaissance we're living in, by the way. ZPower (formerly Zinc Matrix Power) has come out with silver-zinc batteries that will be an option on some notebooks next year. Others are looking at large-format zinc batteries for storage at power plants.

There has been a wealth of wisdom imparted from every corner of the blogosphere as to why the domestic auto industry has failed and why it does or does not deserve a bailout from taxpayers. One thing I have learned from my crash course in the auto industry these last two years at Tesla: because (nearly) everybody owns a car, they feel they are qualified experts on all matters automotive. The truth is, the auto industry is very complex, and some of the criticisms that have become the conventional wisdom are misplaced and sometimes naïve, especially what has been written about the auto industry by some tech and social media bloggers. Waving your hands around and talking about making the iCar and/or appointing Steve Jobs as auto Czar is just plain silly, OK? Yes, it is true that the products of the Big Three are poorly conceived and/or poorly executed, but that alone will not save the industry. Also, talking about how you owned an American car in the 1970s and it sucked is totally irrelevant to the issue today. (As the old ad campaign suggested, have you driven a Ford lately?) The fundamental problem is OVERCAPACITY. Supply has exceeded "true" demand for many years. This shouldn't happen in efficient markets but this imbalance was perpetuated by the availability of essentially free credit that allowed consumers to overbuy and overspend. The industry was tooled up and structured to deliver against total market sales of 17MM units a year. When credit dried up this last summer -- and markets started the wrenching process of reaching a new equilibrium -- it was shocking to watch as the annualized sales figures dropped 20 percent, 30 percent and then over 40 percent by November. For those who question why the management wasn't prepared, imagine seeing your total market size shrink 40 percent in four months after being generally level or climbing for years. At the New York Auto Show in March, a lot of the discussion was about forecasting the coming reduction in total market size, which is an important thing because it takes time in the industry to adjust production volume (i.e., reduce shifts and close plants) to meet demand. People were debating whether it was going to go from 17MM units to 16 or 15MM. The most conservative projections were, if I recall, for 14M. In November, the number was 10M. Because the underlying reasons for the previous market size were driven by the temporary -- and now evaporated -- availability of cheap credit to anybody with a pulse, this shocking dislocation is likely to be closer to the true market size going forward. To the credit of the manufacturers, their plans submitted to congress assume future sales in the 11MM unit range, so they have gotten past denial and are into acceptance. This leaves the very ugly process of restructuring the industry to be healthy in a market that has shrunk 36 percent in four months. So what does this mean in terms of all of the helpful advice being proffered? In my opinion, there is no way around the following conclusions: 1.) The industry must shrink capacity dramatically and quickly to be healthy. 2.) Therefore, a massive restructuring is inevitable. This could be bankruptcy or something that looks just like it but uses nicer words. 3.) In this restructuring, many jobs will be lost. To try to protect jobs (or uncompetitive wages) in this process is simply to be providing welfare and not confronting market reality. Propping up the industry with the logic that it will preserve jobs when the fundamental problem is overcapacity is equivalent to the UAW "jobs bank" that most people immediately recognize as absurd. The problem is that it is a very scary prospect, and otherwise intelligent people start sounding the alarm with overblown predictions of doom. They say we will have no industrial base, as if somehow the end result of this will be the total destruction of the entire manufacturing capacity of the industry, as opposed to a resizing. They say there will be millions of jobs lost, as if taking steps to artificially sustain these jobs will somehow fix the problem (it will exacerbate it). I wonder if these folks realize that the rationale they are using (pain avoidance) is the same thing that they criticize Detroit management of -- not adjusting to market realities sooner. Daryl Siry is the former chief marketing officer for Tesla Motors. He now consults on marketing and the automotive industry. You can read more here: http://darrylsiry.blogspot.com.

Oops. Think, the Norwegian company that wants to bring a two-seater, all-electric economy car to the urban masses, halted production on Monday according to Reuters and is seeking a bailout. The Norwegian government, however, has already told the company to suck a herring. The company needs around 100 million to 200 million crowns -- that's $14.5 million to $29 million-- in short term guarantees to stay afloat. "We are in a very serious situation," said Richard Canny, the relatively new CEO, said in a news conference, Reuters reported. "We would not have taken these actions if it was not serious. We need to intensify efforts to bring in new capital." Bankruptcy, something that occurred in Think's past, is a possibility. However, the company hopes to start production next year. The problem? Think says it needs capital and that parts suppliers are driving a tough bargain. Maybe so, but Think has another big problem. Namely, that electric cars continue to be really, really expensive. Batteries aren't cheap and they improve slowly. I did a cost analysis of the Think City last month. The car costs about $42,000 if you planned to own it for seven years. That's a lot for a car that, if brought to the states, couldn't even hit the 65 mile per hour freeway speed limit. (Technically, I don't even know if it's freeway legal. Think sells it for city driving.) Petter Hummel at RohneSelmer, the dealer in Oslo that started to carry the Think City last month, told me he's sold a few and gets a lot of requests for tests drives. But that's also the experience Toyota had with the all-electric Rav 4 in the '90s. Lots of interest and only a few sold. Electric cars are a great idea, but Think's experience shows it's going to be a rocky road for startups and established car makers alike.

It's plastic for paper at Dell. The Round Rock, Texas-based computer company said today that it will eliminate about 10 percent of the packaging materials that come with its PCs and laptops and will increase the amount that can be recycled. Over the next four years, this could eliminate 20 million pounds of corrugated cardboard and other annoying crud. In the place of cardboard, Dell will employ air bags made from high-density polyethelene, and a good portion of that plastic will come from recycled milk jugs and laundry bottles. Dell, of course, is a massive consumer of packaging materials. I once knew a stock analyst who used to have a source at the company that sold cardboard boxes to Dell. He'd estimate Dell's quarterly shipments by the amount of cardboard the company bought. Thus, the switch to plastic is a shot in the arm for recyclers. An estimated 33 million milk jugs will get reincarnated into computer packaging next year, the company said.