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AGORACOM Maintenance Alert: Going Offline Tonight, and Friday night for about an hour

Dear Members.

AGORACOM will be updating our server framework tonight and tomorrow night. As a result our discussion forums will be down for 1 hour or less.

These problems stemmed from our recent switch to a new web host and some issues with our DNS records (the settings that tell your web browser where our website is located). We believe we have squashed these bugs and are looking forward to pushing these updates through.

In anticipation of this scheduled maintenance we suggest the following:

1. If you are going to post any long and intensive material after 6PM either tonight or on Friday night, save a copy. We don’t expect to lose any data from the last 2-3 hours but better to be safe than sorry

2. Our blog (which you are reading right now) and Twitter account will be unaffected during the downtime, so feel free to contact us at either if you have any issues and can’t reach us through the site.

Best thing to do is to post comments on our blog. Alternatively you can reach us by emailing contactagora@agoracom.com

3. We expect the migration to be very smooth but please let us know if you have any issues.

4. If you are in Toronto, or the GTA, enjoy the weather! Summer is here so go out and have some fun!

We trust the above to be satisfactory as we strive to continually provide you with a great AGORACOM experience.

Thanks,
George and the AGORACOM Team

Message: Arise hangs on in hope of salvaging installation business

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Arise hangs on in hope of salvaging installation business

posted on Jan 15, 12 10:58AM (Log in to use the IP Check tool) ^[?]

Arise Technologies, once a high-flying PV silicon and cell manufacturer and project developer, is on the brink of bankruptcy and struggling to stay intact long enough to make a go of its solar installation business.

In December, the Ontario company filed a notice of intention to propose an arrangement with its creditors, granting it a reprieve from any action they might take until the middle of this month. Last month, Jack Pinder was appointed chief restructuring officer.

Arise has taken the third tranche of a $1.47m bridge loan granted last autumn by Toronto-based hedge fund Radiant Investment Management — it has now taken three tranches of the loan, totalling more than $500,000, to be used to provide interim financing while it works with its secured creditors to develop a detailed plan regarding finalising a potential business combination agreement.

The board of directors, including the chief executive and chief financial officer, resigned after filing the notice of intention, according to The Record newspaper in Kitchener, Ontario.

Ian MacLellan, who founded Arise in 1996 and served as its chief technology officer, resigned in September. Calls to the company’s Waterloo offices were not returned.

Arise has endured a series of blows since August, when it announced a review of strategic options just before reporting a second-quarter net loss of $4.6m on sales of $9.1m. It has yet to report third-quarter earnings.

The systems business, consisting of rooftop and ground-mounted PV projects, was still growing in August and Pinder said he hoped to rescue this part of Arise.

In November, the company declared the insolvency of its German cell manufacturing subsidiary, Arise Technology Centre. Arise shares were delisted from the Toronto stock exchange on 23 December.

Benjamin Romano, Seattle

Published: Thursday, January 12 2012

http://www.rechargenews.com/energy/solar/article297425.ece