BIOLARGO, INC. 10-K

ITEM 1. BUSINESS USE OF FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS IN THIS REPORT This annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2023 (the “Annual Report”) contains forward-looking statements that involve substantial risks and uncertainties. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, included in this Annual Report regarding our strategy, future operations, future financial position, future revenues, projected costs, prospects and plans and objectives of management are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, predictions regarding: • our business plan; • the commercial viability of our technology and products incorporating our technology; • the effects of competitive factors on our technology and products incorporating our technology; • expenses we will incur in operating our business; • our liquidity and sufficiency of existing cash; • the success of our financing plans; and • the outcome of pending or threatened litigation. You can identify these and other forward-looking statements by the use of words such as “anticipates,” “believes,” “estimates,” “expects,” “intends,” “may,” “plans,” “projects,” “will,” “would” and similar expressions, or the negative of such terms, although not all forward-looking statements contain these identifying words. Forward-looking statements also include the assumptions underlying or relating to any of the foregoing statements. We have based these forward-looking statements on our current expectations and projections about future events. Although we believe that the expectations underlying our forward-looking statements are reasonable, these expectations may prove to be incorrect, and all of these statements are subject to risks and uncertainties. Therefore, you should not place undue reliance on our forward-looking statements. We have included important risks and uncertainties in the cautionary statements included in this Annual Report; particularly, the section titled “Risk Factors” incorporated by reference herein. We believe these risks and uncertainties could cause actual results or events to differ materially from the forward-looking statements that we make. Should one or more of these risks and uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions, projections or expectations prove incorrect, actual results, performance or financial condition may vary materially and adversely from those anticipated, estimated or expected. Our forward-looking statements do not reflect the potential impact of future acquisitions, mergers, dispositions, joint ventures or investments that we may make. We do not assume any obligation to update any of the forward-looking statements contained herein, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. In the light of these risks and uncertainties, the forward-looking events and circumstances discussed in this report may not occur, and actual results could differ materially from those anticipated or implied in the forward-looking statements. Any forward-looking statement made by us in this report is based only on information currently available to us and speaks only as of the date on which it is made. When we refer in this report to “BioLargo,” the “Company,” “our Company,” “we,” “us” and “our,” we mean BioLargo, Inc., and our subsidiaries, including BioLargo Life Technologies, Inc., which holds our intellectual property; ONM Environmental, Inc., which manufactures, markets, sells and distributes our odor and volatile organic compound ("VOC") control products; BioLargo Energy Technologies, Inc. (“BETI”), formed to commercialize our proprietary battery technology; BioLargo Canada, Inc., our primary research and development team operating in Edmonton, Alberta Canada; BioLargo Engineering, Science & Technologies, LLC (“BLEST”), a professional engineering services division in Oak Ridge Tennessee; BioLargo Equipment Solutions & Technologies, Inc., which sells our water treatment products; BioLargo Development Corp., which employs and provides benefits to our employees; and Clyra Medical Technologies, Inc. (“Clyra Medical”), which commercializes our technologies in the medical and dental fields. All subsidiaries are wholly owned, except for BETI, BLEST and Clyra Medical. Our Company BioLargo, Inc. is a corporation organized under the laws of the state of Delaware. Our common stock is quoted on the OTC Markets OTCQB “Venture Marketplace” under the trading symbol “BLGO”. Our corporate offices are located at 14921 Chestnut St., Westminster, California 92683. We have a research facility and offices at the University of Alberta in Canada, and our engineering team is located at 105 Fordham Road in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Our telephone number is (888) 400-2863. We operate through multiple subsidiary entities. Our principal corporate website is www.BioLargo.com. We also maintain a blog at www.BioLargo.blogspot.com. Websites concerning our subsidiaries are www.ONMEnvironmental.com, www.CupriDyne.com , www.ClyraMedical.com, www.BioLargoWater.com, and www.BioLargoEngineering.com. The information on our websites and blog are not, and shall not be deemed to be, a part of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. 1 Table of Contents Our Business - Innovator and Solution Provider BioLargo is in the business of creating new cleantech technologies to solve tough, globally relevant problems. We invent, develop, then commercialize disruptive technologies to tackle challenges in air quality, water, environmental engineering, battery energy storage, and advanced antimicrobial medical device platforms. Our model is to invent new technologies that solve specific problems, develop them and prove they work, and then commercialize them with purpose-suited subsidiaries, identify and secure the right partnerships to increase their commercial reach, or potentially sell the intellectual property. Why do we do this work? Every member of our team – including PhD scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs – has a passion for seeking new, never-before-seen innovations that can make life better around the world. We care about safeguarding the environment and human health for future generations. We care about making technologies that are affordable and flexible enough to be accessed around the world. And we care about being the best at what we do – creating best-in-class technologies to solve big, tough cleantech challenges. Some of our areas of focus include environmental problems like PFAS contamination (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), water pollution by pharmaceuticals and micropollutants, air pollution by VOCs, hard-to-treat odors from landfills and sewage plants, infection and wound healing and the creation of energy storage systems that are more affordable, efficient, safer and environmentally friendly. Below you’ll read about the cleantech ventures and projects we are focused on commercialization today. Behind those, however, is a pipeline of other cleantech innovations in various stages of development associated with our expansive array of issued and pending patents, and that have been funded in part by over 90 government grants. We operate our business in distinct business segments: ● Odor and VOC control products, including consumer products, such as the Pooph-branded pet-odor control product, and our flagship industrial odor control product, CupriDyne Clean Industrial Odor Eliminator, sold by our subsidiary ONM Environmental, Inc.; ● Water treatment equipment and solutions, including our PFAS removal system the Aqueous Electrostatic Concentrator (AEC), our water reuse and recycling technology co-developed with Garratt-Callahan called AROS, and our micro-pollutant treatment and energy-efficient disinfection solution, the AOS, all sold by our subsidiary BioLargo Equipment Solutions & Technologies, Inc.; ● Battery energy storage system solutions being developed by our partially owned (96%) subsidiary BioLargo Energy Technologies, Inc.; ● Medical products based on our technologies, including the FDA-cleared Bioclynse surgical wound irrigation solution sold by our partially owned (53%) subsidiary Clyra Medical Technologies, Inc.; ● Our professional engineering services division, which, in addition to serving outside clients on a fee for service basis, supports our internal business units, through our partially owned (78%) subsidiary BioLargo Engineering, Science & Technologies, LLC ("BLEST"); ● Our research and support personnel, through our wholly-owned subsidiary BioLargo Canada, Inc., located on campus at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. Odor Control (Consumer and Industrial) ONM Environmental, Inc. is BioLargo’s wholly-owned subsidiary that delivers robust and comprehensive products and services to control and mitigate odor and VOCs for both industrial and consumer applications. Its flagship product – CupriDyne® Clean – is applied to odor-emitting masses such as landfills and composting facilities by misting systems, sprayers, water trucks and similar water delivery systems designed, manufactured and installed by ONM. It is also sold to third parties under private label brands, including for consumer brands such as the “Pooph pet odor eliminator". Pooph - Consumer Private-Label Products We sell privately labeled products based on our technologies to third parties who market and sell the products under their own brand names. The most successful thus far is the Pooph branded pet odor control product sold directly to consumers and to national retailers including Walmart, Amazon, and Chewy.com by Pooph Inc. In addition to purchasing product from us at an agreed-upon manufacturing margin, Pooph Inc. pays us six percent royalty on their sales in exchange for exclusive rights to our technology for pet odors. During the year ended December 31, 2023, revenues from sales to Pooph comprised 82% of our company-wide revenue. The success of Pooph is an example of our goal to develop distribution channels that do not rely on our in-house sales and distribution infrastructure. We continue to explore potential partnerships and products along these lines with other parties, and to support existing private label products. 2 Table of Contents Industrial Odor and VOC Solutions We believe CupriDyne® Clean is the number-one performing industrial odor-control product in the market, and that it offers substantial savings to our customers compared with competing products. We have been and expect to continue selling product to municipalities and some of the largest solid waste handling companies in the country, with a portion of chemistry product sales resulting from national purchasing agreements (NPAs). ONM Environmental continues to focus on securing more contracts with existing customers and developing business with new customers. ONM Environmental holds General Engineering, Electrical, Plumbing and Low Voltage contractor licenses issued by the California Contractors State License Board, and offers a menu of services to landfills, transfer stations, wastewater treatment facilities as well as facilities in non-waste related industries. These services include engineering design, construction, installation, ongoing maintenance and on-site support services to assist our clients in the implementation and continued use of the various systems that deliver our liquid products in the field (such as misting systems). South Korean Joint Venture Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, we partnered with a leading wastewater treatment solution provider based in South Korea in a joint venture to commercialize our CupriDyne® Clean products in South Korea. We own 40% of the joint venture. Although the joint venture established manufacturing and is marketing the product, the pandemic significantly impacted the expected growth of the company. While the local management team continues to market the product to industrial clients, their efforts have struggled to gain a foothold. We are not obligated to contribute additional funds to the venture, and cannot predict its future success. BioLargo Equipment Solutions & Technologies – Innovative Water Treatment Solutions Over the years, we have developed multiple innovative technologies and equipment platforms that focus on challenging issues in the water treatment industry, including the AOS technology (developed to remove micro-pollutants), the AEC (developed to remove per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS), and the AROS water reuse technology (co-developed with Garratt-Callahan). As a result of increase in interest from potential customers for our PFAS solutions, we believe we will be better able to serve this market with a uniform identity and operating unit called BioLargo Equipment Solutions & Technologies, Inc. (“BEST”), which will manage the sales and distribution of our water treatment products and related services. As we transition this venture from incubation to commercialization, we are focusing staff and resources we believe necessary for success. Ultimately, BEST will be reflected as a new operating segment in our consolidated financial statements. In February, 2024, three respected and experienced veterans of the water industry joined BEST’s board of directors to assist the company in its efforts to commercialize its innovative water treatment technologies. These are: 1) Jeffrey Kightlinger, former CEO of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, 2) Sally Gutierrez, retired career senior executive from the US Environmental Protection Agency, and 3) Larry Dick, former Vice Chairman of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and board member of the Municipal Water District of Orange County. Each brings their significant and distinctive experience from decades in the water industry to BEST’s board to help the company create the necessary regulatory and industry connections that will be critical for its efforts to secure larger and more high-profile projects for its PFAS treatment and other water treatment technologies. Securing sales in the water and wastewater industry is a very technically intensive process, and can be long and arduous. The entirety of the sales cycle can be lengthy, in some cases even taking many months or in very large projects, multiple years. The process is also very engineering-intensive, and therefore the staff required to secure contracts for water treatment projects need to be engineers, in most cases. In our company, BLEST’s engineers fill this role. Having secured its first contract to install an AEC system to remove PFAS from drinking water, BLEST has been actively in scoping and bidding water treatment projects for over a year and as a result has developed a substantial pipeline of potential projects in which customers indicate a high level of interest. In addition, BLEST regularly receives inquiries for new projects in development through the company’s network of manufacturer’s sales representatives. It is important to note that additional staffing is needed to meet what we believe is, and will continue to be a rapidly escalating level of customer interest in our solutions. Although BEST is primarily focused on AEC, AROS and AOS, discussed below, it offers comprehensive water treatment solutions, related equipment, and services, some of which may be manufactured by third parties and sold by BEST as an authorized distributor. The AEC, AROS and AOS are discussed in the following sections. AEC, a solution for the PFAS “fo rever- chemicals ” crisis One of the most significant and timely innovations in our portfolio is our per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) removal and collection/disposal solution we call the Aqueous Electrostatic Concentrator (AEC), a novel water treatment system that removes PFAS from water at a lower operating cost while generating only a fraction of the PFAS-laden waste of the most common currently used solutions (carbon filtration, ion exchange, and reverse osmosis). According to the Center for Disease Control, PFAS are a group of chemicals used to make fluoropolymer coatings and products that resist heat, oil, stains, grease, and water. Fluoropolymer coatings can be in a variety of products. These include clothing, furniture, adhesives, food packaging, heat-resistant non-stick cooking surfaces, and the insulation of electrical wire. PFAS are a concern because they do not break down in the environment, can move through soils and contaminate drinking water sources, and build up (bioaccumulate) in fish and wildlife. PFAS chemicals have been linked to cancer, immune disorders, liver dysfunction, and many other human health problems, and are contained in a vast range of manufactured goods, common household products (e.g., cleaning products, cookware), and electronics, and contaminate drinking water in unsafe levels all over the globe. In March 2023 the EPA proposed new drinking water standards that would set maximum contaminant levels for certain PFAS chemicals to four parts per trillion in drinking water – a standard our AEC can meet. We believe these proposed rules will continue to push the market to find and adopt commercially viable solutions to remove PFAS chemicals from water. A surge in environmental and health concerns surrounding PFAS is propelling market demand for PFAS waste management solutions. Shifting regulatory landscapes globally is compelling industries to adopt stringent PFAS was management practices, which include the application of innovative technologies such as our AEC. Additionally, some emerging regulations on PFAS in the U.S. are expected to skew the market toward seeking treatment technologies that produce as little PFAS-laden solid waste as possible, a favorable trend for our AEC that generates very little PFAS-laden waste. Detection of unsafe levels of PFAS around the world has given rise to a number of market opportunities, including in drinking water, industrial wastewater, municipal wastewater, solid waste, organic foods and more. 3 Table of Contents We have successfully validated the AEC as an effective system to selectively extract and collect PFAS chemicals from contaminated water, including performance testing that shows “non-detect” levels of removal, which meets new EPA standards. We have demonstrated more than 10,000 hours of continuous operation showing no materially significant degradation of the AEC system’s components or performance over time. As a modular system, we believe the AEC is scalable to small portable commercial units as well as very large commercial operations, and we believe that our engineering team has the experience to deliver systems to meet the needs of any sized commercial installation. In order to provide a full turn-key solution for our customers, we have developed an expanded offering whereby we can bundle a service package with each customer project that includes a membrane exchange program, the collection of PFAS, and transport and destruction of the PFAS. Our strategy to market our PFAS treatment technology and related engineering services is as follows: 1) focus on demonstrating our technology’s efficacy in first demonstration projects, trials, and early customer deployments with the understanding that this early success can be leveraged to secure larger and more numerous subsequent projects, 2) market our PFAS expertise and our technology by presenting at industry events and conferences around the country, cultivating our status as “thought leaders” in the space, 3) use our network of manufacturer’s representatives and channel selling partners to maximize the number of potential opportunities with early adopters, and 4) engage in discussions with credible distribution partners at established water treatment technology companies. The AEC’s commercial roll-out is being executed with the help of a network of sales representative organizations whose role will be to market and sell the treatment system, related equipment, and the Company’s engineering services to municipal and industrial customers across the country. We have secured channel partner agreements with several sales representative organizations ensuring coverage for most of the continental United States. We have one PFAS project ongoing, in New Jersey, and expect our equipment to be installed and operational before the end of the year. We believe this project represents a key milestone for the commercialization of the AEC, as industry validation of the technology in a first municipal drinking water treatment project will play an important role in convincing additional municipalities to adopt the technology for treating PFAS-contaminated water, as the company will publish reference customer data from the project that highlights the AEC’s distinct advantages over incumbent technologies like carbon filtration and ion exchange. We are currently bidding on and/or in negotiations with multiple prospective industrial and municipal customers to treat PFAS contaminated water. These opportunities include small to medium sized municipalities, waste facilities, Air Force bases, remediation sites, and industrial sites, and we are waiting for our customers to finalize budgets and agreements with us. Currently, our bottleneck for processing additional expanding opportunities for PFAS treatment projects is staffing, and therefore we are currently working to hire additional qualified sales engineers to assist in bidding and specification efforts for new projects. AROS Minimal Liquid Discharge Water Treatment In partnership with Garratt-Callahan, one of the country’s oldest privately held water treatment companies, our engineers developed a “minimal liquid discharge” wastewater treatment system called the Aqueous Reuse Optimization System (AROS) that minimizes industrial wastewater discharges and thus the regulatory fees associated with wastewater discharge, including for uses like cooling towers at data centers. Garratt-Callahan, who invented and patented the technology, is currently marketing the AROS system to its existing customer base as well as new prospective customers. BLEST will serve as the manufacturing partner and Garratt-Callahan will serve as the selling distributor to leverage their national sales force and over one hundred years of providing services and products to customers. Presently, both BioLargo and Garratt-Callahan are engaged in discussions with multiple potential first customers for the AROS system. Advanced Oxidation System (AOS) The Advanced Oxidation water treatment system (AOS) is our patented water treatment device that generates highly oxidative and energetic species of iodine and other molecules which allow it to eliminate pathogenic organisms and organic contaminants rapidly and effectively as water passes through the device. The key value proposition of the AOS is its ability to reduce or eliminate a wide variety of waterborne contaminants with high performance, including the normally hard-to-treat class of recalcitrant water contaminants called “micropollutants”, while using very little electricity and input chemicals. Our proof-of-concept studies and on-site pilot projects have generated results that project the AOS will be more cost- and energy-efficient than commonly used advanced water treatment technologies such as UV, electro-chlorination, and ozonation. Furthermore, our technology has been proven capable of removing hard-to-treat organic micropollutants such as pharmaceuticals from water more quickly and energy-efficiently than other technologies. Together, these characteristics make the AOS an economical and versatile tool to enable wastewater treatment and reuse in the face of emerging water contaminants and increasing regulatory scrutiny on industrial wastewater discharge. 4 Table of Contents The AOS has, broadly speaking, two target applications: 1) treatment of municipal or industrial wastewater to eliminate bacteria, viruses, other organisms, and regulated organic contaminants, while using less electrical energy than other technologies, and 2) treatment of water or wastewater specifically to eliminate micropollutants/pharmaceuticals, at which the AOS particularly excels at compared to existing technologies. Our work to have the AOS adopted in the US and Canada for application 1) has been met with resistance because existing technologies, while less energy efficient than our technology, are effective enough against target contaminants, and our “value-add” of also eliminating hard-to-treat micropollutants isn’t relevant unless regulations dictate that those chemicals must be removed. Similarly, application 2) is only relevant in jurisdictions where those hard-to-treat micropollutants are regulated. Unfortunately, this does not include the US or Canada, but it does include several European countries. For that reason, presently, much of the our business development efforts to secure projects for the AOS focus on development of partnerships to demonstrate the AOS for the European micropollutant market. The AOS has been and will continue to be included as a component of treatment trains (comprehensive systems) we scope for other projects. In addition, it is included in the catalog of offerings being sold through our independent representatives as well as channel partners. BEST will continue to attempt to cultivate sales channels in Canada, Europe and South America, where there has been more interest. BioLargo Energy Technologies, Inc. We acquired a proprietary “liquid-sodium” battery technology and formed a subsidiary to finish its development and commercialize it. The subsidiary – BioLargo Energy Technologies, Inc. (“BETI”) – hopes to capitalize on the ongoing shift toward renewable energy production and the growth in global electricity demand, and the consequent drastic expansion in energy storage capacity in the US and world-wide that will be needed to accommodate increased demand and the intermittent nature of renewable energy sources like wind and solar. The growth in AI (Artificial Intelligence) based computing which spurns the demand for expanded data centers and an increased energy level to operate are occurring just as well as the already insufficient capacity of the electric grid to meet demand is clear. The need for better, safer long-duration battery energy solutions is obvious. During the year ended December 31, 2023, BETI raised $1,005,000 from the sale of its common stock (of that amount, $100,000 was invested by BioLargo, and $50,000 was from the conversion of BioLargo debt). As a result of these sales, BioLargo owns 96% of BETI’s issued and outstanding stock. The company has completed construction of a pilot-scale battery production facility in our Oak Ridge Tennessee engineering headquarters. Prototype batteries will be tested to confirm energy efficiency, useful life expectancy, energy density, safety profile, number of charge/discharge cycles, and other technical claims that we believe will differentiate the battery from incumbent technologies. Batteries built based on the underlying technology a decade ago demonstrated features that far surpass comparable lithium-ion batteries, the dominant incumbent technology in the market, including: ● Increased safety, no runaway fire risks, and a more sustainable design – with no rare-earth elements – that is capable of being manufactured completely from a domestic supply chain ● Ability to charge and discharge completely, with no degradation of performance, ensuring virtually unlimited charge/discharge cycles, and without self-discharge and no out-gassing ● Increased energy efficiency and energy density in comparison to lithium-ion batteries, and a longer useful life expectancy of at least 10 years and expected to be up to 20 years Our battery technology operates at higher temperatures than lithium batteries and much lower temperature than competing sodium-based batteries, and its casing and materials when combined, are heavier than lithium-ion, making it more suitable for stationary energy storage applications like grid-scale energy storage, electric vehicle charging stations, and commercial and residential energy storage, and believed to be less suitable for placement into electric vehicles or portable electronics. We are exploring opportunities to commercialize our proprietary liquid sodium batteries through joint ventures with third parties. The third parties would finance the construction of independent battery manufacturing facilities designed and built under the direction of our engineers, and the joint venture would market, manufacture and distribute batteries. BioLargo would (i) receive a minority equity position in each joint venture, (ii) separately manufacture and sell at a profit to the joint venture certain proprietary battery components, and (iii) receive a royalty on the revenues of the joint venture. Given the global growing demand for better batteries, and, while we are witnessing a number of current examples in which battery manufacturers have secured forward-contracts to supply batteries to its customers with backlogs of orders that amount to multiple years of production capacity, we believe our offer to partner with customers to secure needed inventory provides for a clear potential pathway to access capital, and more readily scale up production to meet demand around the world. At this point, we do not intend to finance and build our own manufacturing facilities, nor would we develop in-house sales channels, although that possibility remains on the table if needed. Clyra Medical Technologies, Inc. - Bioclynse Wound Irrigation Solution Clyra Medical Technologies, Inc. is our partially owned subsidiary creating medical products based on our technologies. Its primary product is a surgical wound irrigation solution called Bioclynse that can help manage patient care and outcomes. The first target market for this product is orthopedics, including hip and knee replacement surgeries. Management believes Bioclynse outperforms competing products as it has proven performance in biofilm disruption and inhibition, is non-toxic and non-cytotoxic, is non-sensitizing to tissue, and unlike competing products, does not require it to be rinsed and/or removed from a surgical cavity. Clyra management is focused on developing partnerships with large, well-established distributors who can help rapidly accelerate the product’s access to clinicians and surgeons in hospitals around the country. In first quarter 2024, Clyra placed orders for approximately $800,000 in capital equipment to support anticipated growth in sales of its Bioclynse line of products, and has secured third-party FDA compliant manufacturing capabilities, as it does intend to build a manufacturing facility. During the year ended December 31, 2023, Clyra sold $1,575,000 in preferred stock, and $35,000 in common stock, to support these efforts. 5 Table of Contents Full Service Environmental Engineering BioLargo Engineering, Science & Technologies, LLC (“BLEST”) offers full service environmental engineering to third parties and provides engineering support services to our internal teams to accelerate the commercialization of our technologies. BLEST focuses its efforts in three areas: ● providing engineering services to third-party clients as well as affiliated BioLargo entities; ● supporting internal product development; and ● advancing their own technical innovations such as the AEC PFAS treatment technology and the battery energy storage system. BLEST operates out of an engineering facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee (a suburb of Knoxville), and employs a group of scientists and engineers, many of whom are owners of the entity (BioLargo owns 82% as of December 31, 2023). The team is led by Randall Moore, who served as Manager of Operations for Consulting and Engineering for the Knoxville office of CB&I Environmental & Infrastructure and was formerly a leader at The Shaw Group, Inc., a Fortune 500 global engineering firm. Many of the other team members are also former employees of CB&I and Shaw, with the exception of more recent staff hires. The team is highly experienced across multiple industries and we believe are considered experts in their respective fields, including: chemical engineering, wastewater treatment (including design, operations, data gathering and data evaluation), process safety, energy efficiency, air pollution, design and control, technology evaluation, technology integration, air quality management & testing, engineering management, permitting, industrial hygiene, applied research and development, air testing, environmental permitting, HAZOP review, chemical processing, thermal design, computational fluid dynamics, mechanical engineering, mechanical design, NEPDES permitting, RCRA/TSCA compliance and permitting, project management, storm water design & permitting, computer assisted design (CAD), bench chemistry, continuous emission monitoring system operator, data handling and evaluation and decommissioning and decontamination of radiological and chemical contaminated facilities. The team has decades of high-level experience in the energy industry. The engineering team has also developed an extended network of trusted engineering subcontractors that assist in serving specific client projects as needed. BLEST engineers generate revenue through services to third party clients, as well as for internal BioLargo projects such as the AEC and battery (revenues from internal projects are eliminated in the consolidation of our financial statements and are designed “intersegment revenue”). Third party contracts include ongoing work at U.S. Air Force bases for air quality control. Efforts to expand this work as well as with other clients are consistently ongoing. The staff time devoted to supporting the AEC (PFAS) and battery related work is demanding and , at the same time, BLEST needs to hire more qualified staff to meet and expanding demand for our growing list of customers and/or expected customers. When we combine the demands of current revenue generating projects and expected growth, we are presented with an obvious challenge to manage quality, timely performance as well as access to qualified staff. We are working carefully to find balance to help insure we meet the demands of both in a practical customer centric and capital conserving way. It may be for example, when we secure larger and larger contracts for PFAS or Garrett Callan related work, we will need to depend heavily on our contact manufactures to meet the customer demands in the near term as we scale up our infrastructure and work force capabilities. Share Purchase Agreement with Lincoln Park On December 13, 2022 we entered into a registration rights agreement (the “Registration Rights Agreement”) and purchase agreement (the “Purchase Agreement”), with Lincoln Park Capital Fund, LLC (“Lincoln Park”), pursuant to which Lincoln Park has committed to purchase up to $10.0 million of the Company’s common stock, par value $0.00067 per share (the “Common Stock”), subject to certain limitations and the satisfaction of the conditions set forth in the Purchase Agreement. Under the Purchase Agreement, the Company has the right, but not the obligation, to sell to Lincoln Park, and Lincoln Park is obligated to purchase up to $10.0 million of the Company’s Common Stock. Sales of Common Stock by the Company will be subject to certain limitations set forth in the Purchase Agreement, and may occur from time to time, at the Company’s sole discretion, over the 36-month period commencing on the date that the conditions to Lincoln Park’s purchase obligation set forth in the Purchase Agreement are satisfied. These conditions include that a registration statement covering the resale by Lincoln Park of shares of Common Stock that have been and may be issued to Lincoln Park under the Purchase Agreement, filed by the Company with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) pursuant to the Registration Rights Agreement, is declared effective by the SEC and a final prospectus relating thereto is filed with the SEC (the date on which all of such conditions are satisfied, the “Commencement Date”). From and after the Commencement Date, on any business day selected by the Company, the Company may, by written notice to Lincoln Park, direct Lincoln Park to purchase up to 100,000 shares of Common Stock on such business day, at a purchase price per share that will be determined and fixed in accordance with the Purchase Agreement at the time such written notice is delivered to Lincoln Park (each, a “Regular Purchase”), provided, however, that the maximum number of shares the Company may sell to Lincoln Park in a Regular Purchase may be increased to (i) up to 125,000 shares, provided that the closing sale price of the Common Stock on the applicable purchase date is not below $0.20, (ii) up to 150,000 shares, provided that the closing sale price of the Common Stock on the applicable purchase date is not below $0.30, and (iii) up to 200,000 shares, provided that the closing sale price of the Common Stock on the applicable purchase date is not below $0.50, in each case, subject to adjustment for any reorganization, recapitalization, non-cash dividend, stock split, reverse stock split or other similar transaction as provided in the Purchase Agreement; provided, however, that Lincoln Park’s maximum purchase commitment in any single Regular Purchase may not exceed $500,000. The purchase price per share of Common Stock sold in each such Regular Purchase, if any, will be based on prevailing market prices of the Common Stock immediately preceding the time of sale as computed under the Purchase Agreement. The Company may deliver a notice for a Regular Purchase to Lincoln Park on any business day selected by the Company, provided that at least one Business Day has elapsed since the purchase date for the most recent prior Regular Purchase effected by the Company under the Purchase Agreement. 6 Table of Contents In addition to Regular Purchases, provided that we have directed Lincoln Park to purchase the maximum amount of shares that we are then able to sell to Lincoln Park in a Regular Purchase, and provided that the closing sale price of the Common Stock on the applicable purchase date for such Regular Purchase is not below $0.10 per share, we may, in our sole discretion, also direct Lincoln Park to purchase additional shares of Common Stock in “accelerated purchases,” and “additional accelerated purchases” as set forth in the Purchase Agreement. The purchase price per share of Common Stock sold in each such accelerated purchase and additional accelerated purchase, if any, will be based on prevailing market prices of the Common Stock at the time of sale as computed under the Purchase Agreement. There are no upper limits on the price per share that Lincoln Park must pay for shares of Common Stock in any purchase under the Purchase Agreement. The Company will control the timing and amount of any sales of Common Stock to Lincoln Park pursuant to the Purchase Agreement. Lincoln Park has no right to require the Company to sell any shares of Common Stock to Lincoln Park, but Lincoln Park is obligated to make purchases as the Company directs, subject to certain conditions. Actual sales of shares of Common Stock to Lincoln Park will depend on a variety of factors to be determined by the Company from time to time, including, among others, market conditions, the trading price of the Company’s Common Stock and determinations by the Company as to the appropriate sources of funding for the Company and its operations. The net proceeds under the Purchase Agreement to the Company will depend on the frequency and prices at which the Company sells shares of its stock to Lincoln Park. The Company expects that any proceeds received by the Company from such sales to Lincoln Park will be used for working capital and general corporate purposes. The Purchase Agreement prohibits the Company from directing Lincoln Park to purchase any shares of Common Stock if those shares, when aggregated with all other shares of Common Stock then beneficially owned by Lincoln Park (as calculated pursuant to Section 13(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and Rule 13d-3 thereunder), would result in Lincoln Park beneficially owning more than 4.99% of the outstanding shares of Common Stock. There are no restrictions on future financings, rights of first refusal, participation rights, penalties or liquidated damages in the Purchase Agreement or Registration Rights Agreement other than a prohibition (with certain limited exceptions) on entering into a “Variable Rate Transaction,” as defined in the Purchase Agreement. Lincoln Park has agreed not to engage in or effect, directly or indirectly, for its own principal account or for the principal account of any of its affiliates, any short sales of the Common Stock or hedging transaction that establishes a net short position in the Common Stock during the term of the Purchase Agreement. As consideration for Lincoln Park’s commitment to purchase shares of the Company’s Common Stock from time to time at the Company’s direction upon the terms of and subject to satisfaction of the conditions set forth in the Purchase Agreement, has agreed (i) to issue to Lincoln Park 1,250,000 shares of Common Stock (the “Commitment Shares”) upon the execution of the Purchase Agreement and (ii) to pay to Lincoln Park a cash fee of $250,000 upon the Company’s receipt of aggregate cash proceeds of $3.0 million from sales of Common Stock to Lincoln Park under the Purchase Agreement. The Company will not receive any cash proceeds from the issuance of the Commitment Shares to Lincoln Park pursuant to the Purchase Agreement. The Purchase Agreement and the Registration Rights Agreement contain customary representations, warranties, conditions and indemnification obligations of the parties. The Company has the right to terminate the Purchase Agreement at any time with one business days’ notice, at no cost or penalty. During any “event of default” under the Purchase Agreement, Lincoln Park does not have the right to terminate the Purchase Agreement; however, the Company may not initiate any regular or other purchase of shares by Lincoln Park, until such event of default is cured. During the three months ended December 31, 2023, we sold 999,384 shares of common stock to Lincoln Park, and received $162,000 in proceeds. During the year ended December 31, 2023, we sold 3,833,230 shares of common stock to Lincoln Park, and received $995,000 in proceeds Intellectual Property We have 26 patents issued, including 22 in the United States, and multiple applications pending. We were issued three patents in the year ended December 31, 2023, and our patents have an average remaining duration of seven years. We believe these patents provide a foundation from which to continue building our patent portfolio, and we believe that our technology is sufficiently useful and novel that we have a reasonable basis upon which to rely on our patent protections. We also rely on trade secrets and technical know-how to establish and maintain additional protection of our intellectual property. As our capital resources permit, we expect to expand our patent protection as we continue to refine our inventions as well as make new discoveries. We regard our intellectual property as critical to our ultimate success. Our goal is to obtain, maintain and enforce patent protection for our products and technologies in geographic areas of commercial interest and to protect our trade secrets and proprietary information through laws and contractual arrangements. We incurred approximately $2,282,000 in expense related to our research and development activities in the year ended December 31, 2023, and $1,319,000 in the year ended December 31, 2022. 7 Table of Contents Competition Given the fragmented nature of the specialty waste industry, environmental engineering and cleantech industry and the different segments within these industries in which we participate directly or through our subsidiaries, we compete with numerous companies. Larger companies within the hazardous materials line of business include Clean Earth, a subsidiary of Enviri Corporation, Clean Harbors, Republic Services, which acquired U.S. Ecology in 2022, Veolia and Covanta, which acquired Circon Holdings, Inc. in 2023 and also recently announced, through its parent company, EQT Infrastructure, its intent to acquire a major stake in Heritage Environmental Services in 2024. We believe we differentiate ourselves from competitors through innovation, reliability and responsiveness, our diverse operating capabilities and regulatory compliant solutions, and the value we provide through providing energy efficient, low output, environmentally superior solutions relative to other waste management, remediation and disposal alternatives in the US and Canada. Executive Officers As of December 31, 2023, and as the date of this report, our executive officers were: ● Dennis P. Calvert: Chief Executive Officer, President and Chairman of the Board ● Charles K. Dargan II: Chief Financial Officer ● Joseph L. Provenzano: Corporate Secretary and Sr. Vice President of Operations Our operational subsidiaries are led by: Subsidiary President ONM Environmental, Inc. Joseph L. Provenzano BioLargo Engineering, Science & Technologies, LLC Randall Moore BioLargo Canada, Inc. Richard Smith Clyra Medical Technologies, Inc. Steven V. Harrison BioLargo Equipment Solutions & Technologies, Inc. Tonya Chandler Employees As of March 29, 2024, we had 33 employees, of which 31 were full-time. Our employees including professional engineers, masters of engineering, and PhDs, as well as sales, support and administrative personnel. We also utilize consultants and independent contractors on an as-needed basis who provide certain specified services, such as professional engineers used from time to time by our engineering group in Tennessee. 8 Table of Contents