Solyndra’s Welcome-Obama Banner Auctioned With Laptops, T-Shirts
Scott Logsdon paid $400 for the 30- foot banner that served as a backdrop when President Barack Obama visited Solyndra LLC in 2010. Matt Sertic snagged a digital projector for $1,300.None of the auction proceeds will go toward repaying the $500+ million the government lost via the DOE guarantee of Solyndra's credit-worthiness.
Others bid on laptops, T-shirts with Solyndra logos and environmental test chambers, the detritus of the solar-panel maker’s collapse after collecting $527 million in U.S. aid under loan guarantees from the Obama administration. More than 400 people attended the start yesterday of a two-day auction in a factory at the company’s idled Fremont, California, headquarters.
“That’s a piece of Americana right there -- that was the banner that welcomed Obama,” said Logsdon, 47, a former Solyndra employee who is now a senior manager at a packaging company. “Solyndra, the new shape of solar” and “Made in the USA,” the blue wall-hanging said.
Solyndra, heralded by Obama on his visit as proof that “the promise of clean energy isn’t just an article of faith,” filed for bankruptcy protection on Sept. 6, days after shutting its operation and leaving 1,100 workers jobless. Its demise has sparked investigations by Congress, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and watchdogs at the Energy and Treasury departments.
The company blamed its troubles on a surge of cheap solar panels imported from China.
Auctioneer Ross Dove, managing partner of the San Diego- based firm Heritage Global Partners, called out bids at top speed. The items ranged from microwaves to a UV solar simulator once used in the production of Solyndra’s tube-shaped solar modules.
Core Assets
Solyndra’s core assets will be sold in an Nov. 18 auction supervised by Imperial Capital LLC, a Los Angeles-based investment bank, according to Solyndra.
The auction of miscellaneous items that continues today was in a Solyndra plant near a $733 million factory the company built with its federal aid. The new facility had robots that whistled Disney tunes to signal when they moved, spa-like showers with liquid-crystal displays of the water temperature and glass-walled conference rooms...MORE
Speaking of which, a story we mentioned yesterday, some deep digging from the Mercury-News:
Solyndra executives collected hefty bonuses in months before Fremont company filed for bankruptcy
