Greetings, and welcome to Plug Power's Fourth Quarter 2021 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Teal Hoyos, Director of Marketing.

Teal Hoyos - Director of Marketing and Communications

Thank you. Welcome to the 2021 fourth quarter update call. This call will include forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements contain projections of our future results of operations or of our financial position or other forward-looking information. We intend these forward-looking statements to be covered by the safe harbor provisions for forward-looking statements contained in Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.

We believe that it is important to communicate our future expectations to investors. However, investors are cautioned not to unduly rely on forward-looking statements and such statements should not be read or understood as a guarantee of future performance or results. Such statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results or performance to differ materially from those discussed as a result of various factors, including but not limited to, risks and uncertainties discussed under Item 1A Risk Factors and our annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2001 as well as other reports we file from time to time with the SEC. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the day in which the statements are made and we do not undertake or intend to update any forward-looking statements after this call or as a result of new information.

At this point, I would like to turn the call over to Plug Power's CEO, Andy Marsh.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Well, thank you, Teal, and good afternoon and thank you for joining our year end conference call. Before we take questions, I'd like to make a few comments about the future.

2021 Plug Power grew revenue over 50% despite the constraints of supply chain and the impact of the pandemic. In 2022 Plug almost doubled revenue. Our position as the first mover in creating the hydrogen economy is our top priority. We've achieved this position because we have focused on customers like Walmart, partnerships like SK, our technologies, our products, and probably what I'm most proud of is foster a creative environment for our great staff.

Why is our position as a first mover so important? Because hydrogen and fuel cell are a $10 trillion opportunity that will change the energy landscape. Many large financial institutions are predicting that up to 20% of world's energy will come from hydrogen. It is our belief to accelerate that transition to a hydrogen economy requires green hydrogen because it is critical for reaching the global climate goals. And to achieve that goal, green hydrogen needs to be ubiquitous. Sometimes I think it's mess that the steps we have taken in the past few years have been to achieve this goal. And let me reemphasize, it needs to be green because any other solution is a half-step.

But focusing on green hydrogen is why we are building out the first green hydrogen network in the U.S. We'll have over 500 tons per day by 2025 and are going to duplicate this network around the world with partners like Acciona in Spain. It's also why we've acquired companies that know how to build hydrogen plants, generate hydrogen, leveraging electrolyzers, liquefying hydrogen, like our recent acquisition Joule, and transporting hydrogen. We are also leveraging all the learnings from our own years of experience to make these offerings better. This journey will continue as we explore partnerships for pipelines and storage.

Plug cannot only provide the green hydrogen but also the apps. We have built more fuel cells in anyone else in the world. Fuel cells that can be used in a variety of applications, from powering forklift trucks for Home Depot, for on-road vehicles with our JV with Renault, stationary products with SK, and you will see more and more apps in the future. We believe that green hydrogen creates a possibility that the business can continue to double for years and years to come. We believe the future is now.

Like many, I've been watching the tragedies unfolding in Ukraine. This crisis is highlighting to people and nations that autocratic governments can be the gas stations to the world. Liberal democracies will be accelerating the energy transition because of this horrible event and Plug is uniquely positioned to create the future as we can help people, companies and governments transition to a carbon-free solution, not in some distant future but today. We can do this because, in very simple terms, Plug creates and builds real Plug products today for this new world.

Paul, Sanjay, and I are now ready to take your questions.

Question & Answers

Questions and Answers:

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Operator

Thank you. We will now conduct the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] Our first question today comes from James West of Evercore ISI. Please proceed with your question.

James West - Evercore ISI - Analyst

Hey, Andy, how you doing?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Okay. Good afternoon, James.

James West - Evercore ISI - Analyst

Good afternoon to you as well. First one from me. I don't think you announced any new green H2 faci - production facilities ordering off-take agreements yet. Am I right about that or should be expecting some announcements very soon?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

It's one of the reasons I have Sanjay here with me. Let me - let Sanjay hop on that, James.

James West - Evercore ISI - Analyst

Perfect.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Hey, James, how are you?

James West - Evercore ISI - Analyst

I'm good, thanks.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Good. So let me first talk about the plants. So again, as we said, we plan to have three plants built in 2022 and we said that we're actually looking to break grounds on many more this year. So that actually gives you basically a network here in North America by the end of 2023 and early 2024. And as it relates to actually our off-take agreements with this green hydrogen. First off, we talked about this a little bit in our shareholder letter, our funnel right now, the sales funnel for that is about 600 tons per day. It comes from a variety of different market. Mobility market, industrial application and natural gas blending and our goal here, as Andy talked about it before, is to secure about 200 tons for that off-take, so you absolutely should be expecting to hear more about it as we go into Q2 of this year in terms of new announcement and signing of these deals.

James West - Evercore ISI - Analyst

Okay, great. And then, just a follow-up for me. The gigafactory in upstate, where does that stand today? Are we rolling out production? What's the production ramp looks like?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Production ramp really starts heavy in early April, James.

James West - Evercore ISI - Analyst

Okay.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

We have started making some electrolyzer stacks there. We - if you go there today, not only do you see - you see the plate stamping equipment. We're well, well positioned. I think in May, James, I think we'll be inviting you all up there to Rochester to show off the new facility to the analysts and our investors. So I - we're planning a big day in May to have a real showcase to walk everyone around.

James West - Evercore ISI - Analyst

Great, looking forward to it. Thanks, Andy. Thanks, Sanjay.

Operator

The next question is from Craig Irwin of ROTH Capital Partners. Please proceed with your question.

Craig Irwin - ROTH Capital Partners - Analyst

Hi, good evening, and thanks for taking my questions. So, Andy, there's a lot of–

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Good afternoon. Good afternoon, Craig.

Craig Irwin - ROTH Capital Partners - Analyst

Good afternoon. Good afternoon. It's definitely a good afternoon in the Northeast, that's for sure.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Yes. Yes it is.

Craig Irwin - ROTH Capital Partners - Analyst

So Andy, there's a lot of moving parts to Plug right now, right? You've got so many different initiatives, so many fantastic partners, your product lines. Just a lot of things to really work through. So can you help us prioritize the key drivers of improving margins over the course of 2022? So in your shareholder letter you talk a little bit about some of the changes that have been made on the service side to improve the serviceability, reliability and economics of service for both Plug and your customers. You've got to gigafactory coming online with obviously utilization revenue from the electrolyzer business and everything else that's working. You've got green hydrogen coming on. There is a lot of different things that could that can really move the margins in a positive way. How would you rank these different initiatives and which ones do you think will make sort of the higher dollar margin contribution to the company as we exit '22?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

I think by far, Craig, the top priority for margins is the green hydrogen network we're building out. That focus and having 70 tons per day of green hydrogen, will have a dramatic impact on our margins. That will start to ramp at the end of 2022 and have a - have significant impact on 2023. That will take a business at it's negative margins today. Sanjay, you expect that to be a 30% margin business.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Absolutely, Andy.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

And by the end of 2023, we should be in that position, Craig. And then when you think about service. What I'm really thrilled about was the 5,000 units that we put out in the field which represented our latest technology. And those units, we already have seen at 50% reduction in service costs. I think from a dollar point of view, it won't be as big as green hydrogen but it will be significant. And look, scale matters and production facilities matter, and the work that we're doing in the production facility, we expect to start seeing continual improvement even with this very difficult supply chain. We brought in, I think you know, Craig, a lot of the leadership who worked in the Tesla Gigafactory in Reno, Nevada, and they've already identified significant cost savings through our products, without changing them, even in this very, very difficult climate we exist in today.

Craig Irwin - ROTH Capital Partners - Analyst

Excellent. Thank you for that. So then as a follow-up, and again, to keep things simple in the context of understanding the levers that are going to drive margins, right? 70 tons per day exiting 2022, what portion of your total production is that? And then what would that be exiting 2022, or sorry not production but customer demand you saw for it? And is it fair to assume those target margins of 30% are what you're probably achieving on some of these early green hydrogen sales, does that simply mathematically come into the mix?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

I'm going to let Sanjay take that since, as you know, Craig, he runs that business every day.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Yeah. So Craig, as you know, I mean I think once we get to producing 70 tons per day, a couple of points to highlight here. I mean, look, as you've already pointed out, despite looking at our margin here in the near term, you can actually extract what kind of pricing we're paying for it and you can also extract what kind of ASP we have. We've shared with you all what is going to be that cost of green hydrogen even without force planned and how that cost continuously go down with plant number two, plant number three. So without even - with a similar pricing of what our customers are paying for grey hydrogen today, with our in-house production of green hydrogen, yes, you're absolutely right. You will see that 30% kind of a gross margin in that business, number one. Number two, things only gets better as you go through 2023 and as you go into 2024 because we're going to keep adding more production capacity. In terms of our internal demand, that number is between 40 to 50 tons per day. That's what our demand is. So as we get to 70 tons, as we get to bigger numbers, this will have multiple effects. One, we actually have an opportunity to sell it to additional new customers, additional new markets. And another thing that also allows us to do is, and this is something very important to us and in our opinion very important to the entire hydrogen economy, which is help industry get through all this force majeure challenges that it often sees. Make sure green hydrogen is economical, ubiquitous. So once this North American network gets built, logistics costs will go down, cost of our green hydrogen continues to go down, and without even changing the pricing structure, we feel very comfortable about the fact that you should see step change in our margins.

Craig Irwin - ROTH Capital Partners - Analyst

Fantastic. Thanks for taking my questions.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Craig.

Operator

The next question is from Colin Rusch of Oppenheimer. Please proceed with your question.

Colin Rusch - Oppenheimer - Analyst

Thanks so much guys. Can you give us a sense of the applications for the green hydrogen demand in the 1,000 tons per day pipeline? Like what percentage is refining, how much of it is material handling and how much is the road transportation?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Colin, you're making Sanjay do a lot. Good to hear you, Colin.

Colin Rusch - Oppenheimer - Analyst

Yeah, totally. You need the work out, man.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, let me let Sanjay take that one.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Thank you, Andy. So, Colin I think when we talk about the 600 tons of sales funnel, call it about 50 or so opportunities. And look, I think in that mix, obviously, you can imagine that it's some of our existing customers that are transitioning from green hydrogen, which means it's in material handling, which means it's also in new apps like stationary and some of the mobility opportunity. That certainly makes up a pretty important chunk of that. Then you go forward and then you look at some of the recent announcement we made with customers like Certarus, where they're actually buying some of our green hydrogen, we have a 10 tons per day off-take agreement with them and that is more for blending purposes, where you can actually start to - almost like a virtual natural gas pipeline where you're starting to do green hydrogen blending. Then beyond that we have a lot of opportunities around the refining industry as well. And some other mainstream industrial application as well. So it's a pretty broad mix, if you would, Colin, when you really think about it. It's not just your traditional transportation market type applications. So the funnel is pretty broad and our goal here is to really get that 600 tons to be more former, somewhere around that 200 tons per day by the end of the year and that's what we're working towards.

Colin Rusch - Oppenheimer - Analyst

Okay, that's super helpful. And then in some of these projects where you're bidding in electrolyzer capacity. I'm just curious what the competitive landscape is and how aggressive it is? You guys have talked about the fact that you're actually building things which is a competitive advantage. But I'm curious how vicious the competition is at this point from a cost perspective and just the technology performance perspective?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Colin, like many businesses, the first gate with customers are, are these people capable of designing a system that can meet their needs? And I think in that area, when you think about the hydrogen ecosystem we built out, the kinds of companies we acquired, we walked through that first gate, I think, cleaner than our competition in most cases. I think when I look at that, that's a real differential advantage. And then the second gate is, we have a factory that can build stacks for electrolyzers. That's a big differential advantage. I think the combined fact that we're experience, that we can build the product, we make decisions and my first criteria with our sales force in electrolyzer is really us screening the customers and not to be pretentious about it. But when we screen and my first question to the sales team is always, are we working with people who actually can build a plant, that they understand the basics? Can they be - can they fund their projects? Do they have a application, a knowledge of application where it can be used? And in many ways the screening process is the other way around. So you take what we're doing with Orascom over in Egypt. You're dealing with people who really know how to build plants. You're dealing with folks who are well funded. You're dealing with folks who have an application of green ammonia, which you can use - substitute green hydrogen today for grey hydrogen. So the screening process is actually the other way around for Plug at the moment. So I would say, when you start looking at a $13 billion funnel, you're really beginning to screen through who really can execute.

Colin Rusch - Oppenheimer - Analyst

That's super helpful. Thanks so much.

Operator

The next question is from Greg Lewis of BTIG. Please proceed with your question.

Gregory Lewis - BTIG - Analyst

Yes, thank you, and good afternoon, everybody.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Hi, Greg.

Gregory Lewis - BTIG - Analyst

Hey, Andy, always a pleasure to talk to you. I was hoping for a little color. This morning, I guess, there was an announcement that a company is looking to move forward with a green hydrogen project in Houston, I believe a 100 megawatt project. Realizing that Plug was - is the first mover - was never going to be the only supplier of green hydrogen in the U.S. but as we think about that, are projects like that something the company is actively going after with the integrated solution? Or is it at this stage in the game, we have a couple of big key customers we're looking to supply obviously, in Australia and elsewhere, as well as building out your existing hydrogen network in the U.S. Just trying to understand if, as we see more projects like these, these are opportunities for Plug?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

So Greg, I know that project quite well.

Gregory Lewis - BTIG - Analyst

Good to hear.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

And so, I - I'm well familiar with it and Plug's well familiar with it.

Gregory Lewis - BTIG - Analyst

Okay.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

It's a very interesting project and I - we're really - we know it.

Gregory Lewis - BTIG - Analyst

Okay. But, so I guess really what I'm trying to understand is, as we think about your manufacturing capacity across your business lines, you do have excess capacity to be a supplier to some of these new - to a potential wave of projects beyond just what the company is targeting for its own capacity.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

That is absolutely correct, Greg, and look, we're looking to increase capacity in ways that go beyond just putting more equipment in. When you're at this stage of a business, you can improve capacity by making enhancements to the product. So a lot of work going on with the electrolyzer MEA. How to improve - how to up the power of the same MEA by 50% and having the same takt time. So we feel well-positioned with our present factory. The other item I'd like to highlight is, if you go look at that factory, there is I think today 300 plus pieces of equipment that have been specified and have been designed and integrated so that we can take that model and duplicate it again. So I feel we have plenty of capacity for 2023 but we are, Greg, looking at, and one of our items for this year is, where do you build the next gigafactory?

Gregory Lewis - BTIG - Analyst

Okay, super helpful, Andy. Always a pleasure. Have a great night.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

You too.

Operator

The next question is from Eric Stine of Craig-Hallum. Please proceed with your question.

Eric Stine - Craig-Hallum Capital Group - Analyst

Hi, everyone, thanks for taking the questions.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Hey, Eric, how are you?

Eric Stine - Craig-Hallum Capital Group - Analyst

Hey, doing well. Good to chat. So maybe just on materials handling. I know you've got the five pedestal customers you mentioned in your write up that you've got three near term, two in the EU, one in North America. I'm just curious how we should think about those maybe playing out in terms of announcements throughout this year? And then curious, as you think about your 2025 expectations or outlook, is there a number you have in mind for the ultimate number of materials handling customers?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

That's a good question, Eric, and let me we step back from the question and highlight the fact how important Europe's becoming to Plug Power. Europe, when you start looking at the pure play hydrogen and fuel cell players, Plug probably has the largest staff or the second largest staff in Europe. We have the facility in the Netherlands. I'm about to go to the grand opening to our facility in Germany in mid-March. We are well-positioned in Europe. And when I look at Europe, Jose has about five or six customers on his list to reach the level of pedestal customers for Europe, all who we've been doing business with. And in the U.S., I think the announcement will come first, there is a - one customer that we're in final stages of to announce. I think ultimately, I'd like to think about it like Jose. I think Jose's outlined for 2030 what we as a business have to do to achieve $4 billion in revenue in that sector. And that's really our target. I think you'll probably also see as the products become simpler, as the hydrogen systems become simpler, there will probably be more work on channels also and that will become more important for the business. So I don't know if there is a ultimate number for pedestal customers. I think there is a goal for market share that we believe penetration rates can be in the 20% level by 2030.

Eric Stine - Craig-Hallum Capital Group - Analyst

Got it. Well, that's not a good segue actually, I was curious. I know, years ago, you acquired a small acquisition but it was a reformer company and the thought was then. Potentially, how do you expand the market into sites with fewer forklifts? Just curious, given what you're building out on the green hydrogen side and the cost profile coming down, maybe some thoughts about where that process stands and how you see that playing out going forward getting into those smaller sites?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Good question, Craig, and when I think about it - and we've been doing some work already. We are developing a 50 kilogram per day system, which is much smaller, which looks more like gas deliveries, which can be done either through Sanjay's hydrogen plants or actually through - think about Walmart as a depot point. And we actually do this today, where we pick up gas at Walmart and may move it to another customer when it makes sense. What we're designing our smaller systems, much lower cost, so essentially that - you'll have a 40-foot container pick it up, drop it off, come back three days later for the new container in place, which had - not to divert but I will a little, but it also is very similar to how we will maintain units at smaller sites. We have a universal engine we're calling it, that comes out by the end of this year and not only those sites will not require service people but we'll be able to deliver hydrogen, take care of any issues that are on-site when we drop by, the modules will be able to be picked up and take back - taken back to centralized center if they need any work. That's really clear and both of those projects are being done and they're really closely linked together, will be finished by year's end and we expect to ship probably a 1,000, 500 to a 1,000 of our universal engine by year's end, which reduces both the product cost but also the service costs. And Eric, if you want to call me another time, I'll be happy to give you more of a detail on that one because it is interesting.

Eric Stine - Craig-Hallum Capital Group - Analyst

Yeah, I'll take you up on that at some point.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

And I did do it justice.

Eric Stine - Craig-Hallum Capital Group - Analyst

All right. Thanks, Andy.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Eric.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our next question is from PJ Juvekar of Citi. Please proceed with your question.

PJ Juvekar - Citi - Analyst

Yes, good afternoon, Andy and Sanjay and Paul.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Good afternoon, PJ.

PJ Juvekar - Citi - Analyst

So my first question is on Hyvia. I think the sales should ramp up in the joint venture in 2022. How many vehicles you think you can make this year, given sort of this difficult supply chain backdrops and chip shortages? And just tell us about how do you see this JV ramping up?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. First, let me take a step back and say I am thrilled with the work at the JV. We have people who are Plug people in France every week. I think we have folks from France who have been coming to Plug. We expect that - I reviewed it this morning, we expect that we will be shipping approximately 250 vehicles this year probably to a list of about 20 different customers. So it's a wide variety of customers. That Master Van product can be leveraged to deliver goods by people like Amazon and it is a real, real attractive offering. By 2030, we expect to deliver about 250,000 of those units. I know that - to another facility, I think I'm going to a grand opening March 14, 15, Teal, for a grand opening of the high-manufacturing facility in France. So it is a - and I've been around long time outside, back at other companies like Lucent. It is a really well-run, very thoughtful product development cycle that we're just really pleased. So the Master Van will be on the road, we'll have the people mover that will come by year's end. There is works going one with taxis. There'll be a next generation platform where there is work coming - going on for two to three years out. So PJ, I'm really pleased and I think 2023 - with all the seeding we're doing with customers this year, I think 2023 or continue to grow and ramp.

PJ Juvekar - Citi - Analyst

All right. Thank you. And my second question is maybe for Sanjay. As you ramp up your hydrogen production, what kind of investments do you need in logistics, like trucks and liquefaction tanks and all that kind of stuff, storage tanks. Do you have that built out as well?

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Great question, PJ. So let's take a step back. Typically how we think about it is like, when you talk about a 15 ton plant, you need about 7 liquid tankers to deliver that hydrogen. That number could go down as the network really gets built out through the U.S., so you can actually leverage plans even better than even one-off plants if you would. And as you've seen with the acquisition of Applied Cryo, now we can build our own tankers. We can build our on-site storage, we can do the vaporizers. So, it really puts us in a position where we can not only control the delivery timeline, we can also reduce the cost and really think about building it faster and that's totally in our control as a part of our vertical integration strategy. And also, in Q1 of this year, you saw that we made an acquisition of Joule Processing, that gets us into the liquefaction business. So when you now take a step back and think about our capability in the green hydrogen generation business, we have our own electrolyzer, we're the largest user of it, and we're looking to sell it to the third parties. We now have our own liquefaction capabilities, we're using it ourselves, and we believe it will actually rival some of the energy efficiency kilowatt hour per kilogram of electricity users versus some of the better liquifiers out there in the market out of the gate, and we see a path where the energy consumption could even get better as you go forward. That's very important to continue to reduce the cost of green hydrogen, and finally from a logistics perspective now, we're able to make it all ourselves. So really puts us in a very unique position from, we buy renewable power and we do everything else. If customer's looking for gases hydrogen, we can provide that; they're looking for components, we can provide that; they're looking for liquid hydrogen, we can provide that; they're looking for liquifiers or the tankers, we can provide that as well. So we feel very, very good about the team that has now become a part of Plug Power and we see a lot of great things coming out of it.

PJ Juvekar - Citi - Analyst

Great. Great work. Thank you.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, PJ.

Operator

The next question is from Bill Peterson of J.P Morgan. Please proceed with your question.

Bill Peterson - J.P. Morgan - Analyst

Yeah, hi, good afternoon, Andy and team.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Hi, Bill, how are you doing today?

Bill Peterson - J.P. Morgan - Analyst

Yeah, doing great, it's been a great day. The first question I have is related to the deal we held in the bed last week. It's an RFI, request for information phase with feedback due by the end of March. Section 816 for electrolyzers, 813 for hubs. Look, I know you guys are aiming for coverage in most of the country and projects, at least the first set of projects are ahead of when any hubs would arrive. But I guess my first question is, is Plug doing anything in terms of engagement or I guess is it important to steer the direction? And then secondarily, what are your expectations, if there are any, in terms of benefits from some of these announced things from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Laws?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

So Bill, I will say this first. If there is a hub in the - the hubs in the U.S., every one of them will use Plug Power products in my opinion. We have been deeply involved in all the hubs that are going on across the country. Specifically, here in New York. I think if you look, there was a press release put out by Senator Schumer right after the RFI came out, where Senator Schumer highlighted Plug Power three times in the press release, and that we've been working very closely with the folks at NYSERDA and other folks in the Northeast in thinking through how you make New York the green hydrogen hub for the country. So we are actively in - Bob, I'm sitting here, Gerry Conway, who's my government affairs person is here with me. We meet - they meet daily, I meet twice a week with them on the work with the hubs. My view of the hubs and a successful hub is one that builds the foundation for the future. I don't view the hubs as a single government grant that allows you to build something. I view it as how do you build a hydrogen pipeline that many people can put hydrogen in and many people can take hydrogen out? And that's how we're trying to help folks think through this, is that this is not a one-time $8 billion opportunity. This is an opportunity for four places or maybe more across United States to build the foundations for the hydrogen economy that really can help grow, not only our business but this entire industry.

Bill Peterson - J.P. Morgan - Analyst

Okay, thanks for that. Second question is, I guess it's similar but it's also related to a few other earlier questions. We think about your sort of merchant business for electrolyzers, as well as captive for your green hydrogen production. I guess you have - I know you've been out with some projects in the U.S., but I guess, how important is also, I'd say, I don't know, gain share or sell outside of your captive business or would you expect these opportunities to be addressed by competitors? And I guess really holistically, what is your win rate? You kind of talked earlier about you being somewhat selective on this but just curious, obviously you have Australia and Egypt and other things overseas but curious to how you view other hydrogen projects in U.S. that are, let's say, not your own sort of captive production?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

I would say, Bill our win rate, the ones that have come to the finish line, it's probably close to 50%. And I know if you talk to our team they would say higher but probably close to 50%. We're not - we want to build - make the pie big. We've been selling - we're selling to people who were - who could be competitors Sanjay, we're leveraging our technology. We believe that a huge pie helps the hydrogen economy. So we're winning deals and I think we're winning the kind of deals we want. I think that we haven't spoken much about government policy during this discussion but it could really accelerate here in the United States. We know we've seen previews of the state of the union tonight and in the State of the Union, the President is going to address the need for the climate change legislation where there is a $3 tax credit for green hydrogen, which Senator Manchin supports. We think before the election, there will be a climate bill and we believe there will be a climate bill that's very, very friendly to hydrogen. That portion of the bill and Biden Build Back Better has not been controversial.

Bill Peterson - J.P. Morgan - Analyst

Yeah, thanks for that, and good luck.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Bill.

Operator

The next question is from Stephen Byrd of Morgan Stanley. Please proceed with your question.

Stephen Byrd - Morgan Stanley - Analyst

Hey, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Hey, Stephen, how are you today?

Stephen Byrd - Morgan Stanley - Analyst

Doing great. Doing great. How are you doing?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Good.

Stephen Byrd - Morgan Stanley - Analyst

Good. Well, thank you. I wanted to explore the U.S. green hydrogen hub opportunity more. I guess, as I understand it, I mean, obviously, the infrastructure bill they did pass does include quite a bit of money for these and we could see I guess as many as eight or more of these hubs, I guess it's unclear. Would you mind just talking a little bit to, at least as you understand, that the process for determining the allocation of these money? And just building on what you mentioned earlier, I wasn't completely sure sort of how dependent you felt you were on that money. I mean, you guys are doing so much anyway but I'm just curious how your work ties into that federal money that's available for hubs?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

First, I want to make it clearly stated. My business plans through 2025 is not dependent upon those hubs.

Stephen Byrd - Morgan Stanley - Analyst

Yup.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

That being said, the hubs are a great opportunity. If you're asking me a process question, as you know the RFI went out, I think it's due more of Gerry to respond to the RFIs. Pretty general, the RFI, there is by 20 questions, Gerry?

Gerard L. Conway, Jr. - General Counsel

Yeah.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

About 20 questions, which are rather generic. But I think, helpful for the DOE to start formulating. We expect the formal RFP, I'm hearing late May. And that, I think you would start seeing awards and directions by the end of the year. And it may start out with smaller projects that grow and that's I think the process that's going on at the moment, Stephen. And look, we're working closely, as I mentioned with all the folks. I think there is still, quite honestly a lot not known about the process. One who can lead a hub is one of those debates and discussions that hasn't been clarified yet but I think the DOE in this RFI is trying to get that clarification. From a Plug perspective, I just see it as an additive. Anything that helps grow the hydrogen economy, makes hydrogen more attractive. It's just good for Plug Power because we have all the capabilities to meet people's needs.

Stephen Byrd - Morgan Stanley - Analyst

That's helpful. It does sound like a good opportunity. And I wanted to also just talk about the green hydrogen generation network in Europe. You've given some updates in the past, the 3Q letter, gave some context there but could you just maybe expand a little bit on your latest thinking on the expansion andthe size of the EU hydrogen network that you mentioned in the 4Q letter as well? Just any additional color would be greatly appreciated.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

I'm going to give that to Sanjay.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Hey, hey, Stephen, how are you?

Gerard L. Conway, Jr. - General Counsel

Great, thank you.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Great. So again, look, I think given some of these unfortunate events here. I'm sure you've seen what has the LNG prices done in Europe. I mean, it's touching the levels where all of a sudden I think hydrogen is getting into parity even before anything else, even from a Btu content standpoint. But look, our business plan is not contingent upon what the commodity prices does from a short-term perspective. So we've been thinking a lot about it. And our focus in Europe really has been - the electricity price in Europe as you very well know, in some location can be very, very high, whether it's renewable or just the standard electricity prices. So what - and that's why, the partnership with Acciona is a very important one. Because in Spain, given the solar resources that you have, you can really get a very attractive price of that solar energy. That's why we're working with them. We have about five sites that we're evaluating but we're going to hone in into two, that is going to lead to about 2 of the 15 tons per day plant that we're looking to have our operation by the end of 2024. That's with the Acciona JV. And we're looking at location where you have the right wind resources, where you can actually have a right LCOE from a wind power perspective and how do you bring that hydrogen into the demand center? That's another area where we're spending a lot of time and we're even looking at - we almost think about, Stephen, from a triangle perspective. How do you bring that lowest possible green hydrogen in Europe? So as a part of our 500 tons by 2025 and then go into 1,000 tons by 2028, Europe is absolutely a very important and a big part of that. We have said that with Acciona. We want to have about 100 tons per day in the medium term and we're working with several other partners and as we sit here right now, we can kind of soft circle, if you would, visibility on what we might be building over next several years to about 200 tons per day.

Stephen Byrd - Morgan Stanley - Analyst

Got it. Thank you.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

I'm just going to add one - I'm going to add one item, Sanjay, is that in Europe because of what's happening in Ukraine, I really strongly believe I was sitting with a natural gas pipeline operator, one of the largest, yesterday in New York and both of us spent the - spent a long time explain to me how natural gases we'll get to Europe but what the real discussion was about, this will accelerate the transition. Europe is not going to want to be dependent on Russia for natural gas in the future. And all the focus is on how do you accelerate this climate change goals in sync with also improving national security and hydrogen is one of the solutions.

Stephen Byrd - Morgan Stanley - Analyst

Super helpful. Thank you very much.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Thank you.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Stephen.

Operator

The next question is from Alex Kania of Wolfe Research. Please proceed with your question.

Alex Kania - Wolfe Research - Analyst

Great, thanks. Thinking about -

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Hi, Alex.

Alex Kania - Wolfe Research - Analyst

Hi, there. How are you?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Okay.

Alex Kania - Wolfe Research - Analyst

Good. So I have a question for Paul to throw something his way.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Oh.

Alex Kania - Wolfe Research - Analyst

Just given the cash position, how does the accounting end up working for the investment portfolio, if we think about earnings over the course of the year?

Paul Middleton - Chief Financial Officer

If you're talking about the cash investments we made in the portfolio?

Alex Kania - Wolfe Research - Analyst

Yeah, that's right. Given how volatile things are. Yeah.

Paul Middleton - Chief Financial Officer

Yeah. Well, I mean in the market that we're in, as you probably know, in short-term instruments, you're not getting a lot of yield anyway, so we're just trying to squeeze what we can out of that. There's actually some very strange rules that given the - particularly, we have so much cash, it's actually a problem for me. I can't - it limits the amount of cash I can invest and so that's an interesting problem I've never had before. But I'm not - I don't think that's going to be a huge - unfortunately, not a huge deterrent because of those limitations but it's also not a huge impact because of the markets where there's just not a lot of yields to begin with. It's - our focus is really preservation. It's the big things that we're investing in where we're going to get the big yield between the hydrogen platform and the different acquisitions we made in growing those and things like that, where our primary focus is of investment. So I hope that answers your question.

Alex Kania - Wolfe Research - Analyst

Yeah, great thanks. And then the other one just kind of going back to Europe. Just trying to think about, there is certainly a lot more focus on networks there from some of the network operators, probably more seriously or more advanced stages that we're seeing in United States. So how do you see, as you're developing this hydrogen network, how could you integrate with that and maybe had a different - differentiate yourself maybe versus some of the other peers that are active on pure hydrogen electrolysis or whatever in the continent there?

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Sure. Fair question. I think that the way we're looking at it is obviously, Europe so far has really been mostly a gaseous market. Now, given I think what we just touched on with what we're trying to do with Acciona is we're actually going to be building two liquid plants out of the gate because we think liquid is going to have to be a part of the mix. But you brought up a really important and a good point. What we're doing here, Alex, is we're working with some of the renewable developers in the right location, where they either have secured the land or they're working on securing the right PPA. And I think what ends up happening here, in some of those locations, you might actually end up and again, Europe actually has a better network as you pointed out, even from a hydrogen delivery perspective, from a pipeline standpoint, Europe has been mostly a gaseous market. So the way I think, this is such a big market, I'm sure there will be many players that'll be successful but the way we see it, we're going to work with the renewable developer in the right location where we can really secure the lowest cost - possible cost of electricity. That's the first thing. Whether it's Denmark, whether it's Spain, whether it's even thinking about North Africa if you were bringing hydrogen via pipeline into the European market. And the second piece that you will see here is for that 100 plus mile delivery, it is almost going to be like a last mile liquefaction, if you would. And that's the capability we bring to the table, and we'll work with the right partners on that front. So that's basically how we see it. Look, there will be many players that are going to be successful but I think given what Andy just touched on that this energy transition is going to have to be even happening faster, becoming even more critical given this recent environment. This market probably moves very fast and that's why we're being very thoughtful and strategic about who are all the right developers that we can work with so that we're actually putting our flag post, if you would in terms of really being able to secure this right source of renewable in the right location to serve that market.

Alex Kania - Wolfe Research - Analyst

Great, thanks very much.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Alex.

Operator

The next question is from Amit Dayal of H.C. Wainwright. Please proceed with your question.

Amit Dayal - H.C. Wainwright - Analyst

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

So good to hear from you.

Amit Dayal - H.C. Wainwright - Analyst

Thank you, Andy. Hope you're doing well. Just a quick question on the outlook, Andy. For revenues for 2022, what portion of that do you think comes from the international markets for you?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Oh, that's a good question. I think the international market will be about 25%, Paul?

Paul Middleton - Chief Financial Officer

Yeah.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

About 25%.

Amit Dayal - H.C. Wainwright - Analyst

Okay, thank you. And then, as we get into '23 with all of these partnerships you have in those markets. Does that portion grow to - towards 30%, 40% or maybe even higher in the next few years?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

I think the answer that question is yes, Amit. I think part of it will have to do with - I think I would say yes. I would think by 2025, you're probably talking 40%.

Amit Dayal - H.C. Wainwright - Analyst

Okay. Okay. Thank you for that color, Andy. And just–

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Yeah.

Amit Dayal - H.C. Wainwright - Analyst

With respect to the new units, the ones with this enhanced technology that you have been deploying. Is that now the standard units that are going to all the customers?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Yes.

Amit Dayal - H.C. Wainwright - Analyst

Okay. Got it. All right. And are you getting a higher sales price for these offerings as well? I mean, obviously, the service side, you're saving costs on those. Is the price point also supporting the margins on this?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

So I would just say this that we hate discussing pricing strategies on calls like this, Amit. Let me just say that we try to get the best price for the value we create with our customers.

Amit Dayal - H.C. Wainwright - Analyst

Okay, understood. I'll take my other questions offline, Andy. Thank you.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

All right.

Operator

The next question is from Joseph Spak of RBC Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Joseph Spak - RBC Capital Markets - Analyst

Thanks so much. I was wondering if you could spend just maybe a minute on the SK E&S JV that was completed this past quarter? Just a little bit more maybe on the ambitions, what are some of the near-term goalpost we should look for in that venture? What exactly is each partner contributing and maybe also on the capitalization? That SK investment you got a while back, is that earmarked for the straley [Phonetic]?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

No. That is Plug Power money to spend as Plug Power pleases, Joseph. Let me take a step back, I was actually on a Board call for the JV this morning. And the JV's top priority is the development of the South Korean market. With a real focus on stationary products and by this year we will be shipping stationary products to the JV, the initial offer. That will grow and continue to grow through 2024. The JV also has won some mobility opportunities for buses, which could be about 750 Gen - jet ProGens per year. But Korea is the first and main focus. There is a good deal of activity going on in South Vietnam, which is another - or Vietnam, I'm showing my age, in Vietnam and that is another area. One of the areas that I'm trying to make sure the JV is really focused on because a huge opportunity is putting power on the grid in South Korea, which could help us meet our 2025 goals and most of the focus - most of the people working on that product are - in that JV at the moment are focused on that product. From a capital point of view, Paul, I think I would probably put the number over the next three years in the $100 million tight range?

Paul Middleton - Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, that's about right.

Joseph Spak - RBC Capital Markets - Analyst

All right. Thanks. Thanks for that color, Andy. And maybe just next question is really more of housekeeping. The one gigawatt electrolyzer backlog target by the end of the year. Can you just remind us where that stands right now, sorry if I missed that. And also, is that - that's captive and external or is that - it - maybe just the breakdown there and how you're thinking about that?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

So all of that's external, what we provide, Sanjay is not part of our numbers. I mean, Sanjay's business is just a transfer within the business itself. So as I mentioned earlier in the call, Joseph, we have today a $13 billion funnel for that business, which is - rough numbers is probably 17 to 18 gigawatts of opportunity. So our ambitions - as I mentioned earlier in the call, we're really focus on folks who we feel can execute, that they understand; folks who have the money; and folks who have real applications. One of the really interesting parts of this market is that there is a huge opportunity to substitute. The plant we're doing in Egypt. The off-take for that green hydrogen is really just - sorry everyone. I don't know if they're going to. The off-take for that green hydrogen, that off-take is actually the feeder ammonia plant that exist today that uses grey hydrogen. And I keep on finding more and more of these opportunities which I really like, where it's a easy substitution that assures that the revenue and the business model actually works. So that's where a good deal of that funnel is and a good deal of the growth opportunity exists. I hope that helps, Joseph.

Joseph Spak - RBC Capital Markets - Analyst

Yeah, thanks for the color.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Sorry about the phone.

Operator

The next question is from Tom Curran of Seaport Research Partners. Please proceed with your question.

Tom Curran - Seaport Research Partners - Analyst

Good afternoon. As I zero in -

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Hi, Tom.

Tom Curran - Seaport Research Partners - Analyst

As I zero in on the gross margin ambitions a bit, this might be another rare one for Paul. So before services, I know that you set a target of reducing costs on a per unit basis by 30% by the end of this year. Could you confirm or update that goal of 30% and then now that we are two months into the year with presumably better visibility, give us some idea of what the quarterly progression toward that year-end level should look like?

Paul Middleton - Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, well there is multiple initiatives that we're working on. The - one, the mix of the units that we put in last year just performed better out of the gate. So you're going to see that element in the mix. Second is that we've actually - we're retrofitting a number of those initiatives back into the fleet. That's happening in different stages with different customers and different timelines. So you're going to see a progression in that regard as well. The percentage that you quoted is still our target, that's what we're working towards. You're going to see probably more of the benefits starting to really feed in, in the second half, just because of timing, in terms of how it works. Basically, at the end of the day, these initiatives extend the life of these parts, extend - and cause less touches and so as we make these improvements, you start to feel that and what would have been the previous cycles that happened in that second half and onward. So that's why you're going to start to see the big benefits in the latter part of this year. I think it's going to be a step function change as we continue to make these improvements, continue to ship new units with the new technology and then of course, you've got, as we move forward, a lot of customers that refresh sites and units. And so, that helps and provides benefits as well. So you will definitely see more progression in the second half towards those goals and then more of a step function change next year.

Tom Curran - Seaport Research Partners - Analyst

That was a helpful summary. Thanks, Paul. And then, Andy, what does last month's announcement about your strategic collaboration with Atlas Copco and Fives tell us about your strategy for H2 liquefaction plants and equipment? Do you remain open to and expect to stay competitive in bidding on projects where the customer wants to choose a rival of Atlas Copco or Fives for the the liquifier components? Just trying to parse this out. So you chose to Joule in-house but have opted for collaboration when it comes to those to do. And what do you expect your strategy to be for distribution and storage where, for example, a company like Williams, the midstream company expects to play a role? Just trying to parse where you'll be expecting to actually own it or have a piece of it, in the vertical integration strategy and where you'll be partnering? And if so, extent that partnering will be exclusive?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Tom, I'm going to let Sanjay answer that question because he worked on that strategic fields with his team.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Yeah. So, Tom. Again, I think, as you know, one of the - look, I mean Atlas, as you know, obviously, from the terrible expander standpoint, obviously is a very big player in that market. The reason to do that is they have the visibility on what our needs are and we have a visibility from a lead time perspective with Fives being the fabrication house that has been around for such a long time. So what this consortium really brings to the table is now, we obviously have the design, capabilities within Joule, in terms of making the liquifier with hopefully the best possible energy efficiency. Now, we have a partner in the turbos, compressors, we have a partner in the fabrication. So when you put that consortium together, one, for our internal uses, it's a cost saving opportunity for us, it's controlling the channel, it's basically also controlling and making sure that there is no supply chain challenges that is beyond our control that we can manage it ourselves. So that's what comes to the table. And second thing is similar to our electrolyzer business, look, this is a massive market. If we have parties and partners that are looking to buy liquifier our electrolyzer from us, this consortium, obviously will be able to supply to the third-party as well because, as Andy said, our goal is to basically grow the pie here. Hydrogen is a massive market, green hydrogen is going to be a massive industry. We really want to make sure that we're providing to our customers. If they want a capital equipment from us, we're prepared to do that. If they are looking for a hydrogen molecule from us, we're also able to supply to them as well. So that's really what that consortium is.

Tom Curran - Seaport Research Partners - Analyst

Got it. Thanks for taking my questions.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Thank you, Tom.

Operator

The next question is from Ameet Thakkar of BMO Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Hello. Hello, Ameet.

Ameet Thakkar - BMO Capital Markets - Analyst

Hi, Andy. Thanks for squeezing me in.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Sure.

Ameet Thakkar - BMO Capital Markets - Analyst

Real quick from me. Just - it looked like there was a pretty big sequential increase in R&D and SG&A, like 60%, 70% versus the third quarter. And just thinking about how we should think about that for the upcoming year or next quarter? Is there some lumpiness associated with that at the end of the year or how do we think about that going forward?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Some of that's R&D associated with building out the first big stationary plant. So I do think that there is probably $6 million, $7 million I would call lumpiness where it's just R&D material to build out the engineering model for the first products. But I think that portion of it, Paul, would mostly go away.

Paul Middleton - Chief Financial Officer

We also, as you know, we announced three acquisitions. And so, there was some legal costs - one-time legal costs. A lot of that work would have been done prior to year end, other specialty firms that help us with diligence and accounting and things like that, that's all in there. So definitely some lumpiness but I think, rough numbers, that 90 million bucket per quarter is probably a good proxy.

Ameet Thakkar - BMO Capital Markets - Analyst

Great, that's super helpful. And then, just going back to that hydrogen supply business and thinking back from the start of the year, there was obviously some of the force majeure issues that you guys have highlighted throughout the - throughout '21. But going forward, like you guys mentioned prices as well is going to be impacting the margins on that business as we exit '21. Like, there are no additional force majeures that you've kind of encountered in the second half of 21 and you guys have mentioned that a couple of times, I think, how you're just getting out of that force majeures. Is that a problem you've incurred a lot and what drives that, besides gas supply related to weather disrupted?

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

Go ahead, Sanjay.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Yeah. So, Ameet, on that, a couple of factors in play. So when it's strictly relates to our hydrogen molecule costs from our suppliers, natural gas has a pretty big impact to that. So the price goes up as a function of increase in the natural gas prices. So you saw some of that in Q3, that's what happens. Now, in terms of the force majeure and that's why, we think about this is not only supporting Plug Power customer, we think the network that we're building is so critical for also the entire hydrogen industry because what often happened is you've had either plant maintenance where the plant went down for longer than expected sometimes, you had a supply cut in the feed gas that was supposed to go into some of the hydrogen plants. So we have had to deal with situations last year, where in situations, there were a couple of plants that were being down at the same time. So we managed through that, which is why logistics cost went up to make sure that our customers' mission critical application are maintained, we're supporting that. Well, going forward, it's difficult to say that there is not going to be force majeure. But as we go into second half of this year and really think about 2023 and as our network is built, I think it's going to be very beneficial for the entire hydrogen economy because we'll be able to step up and really deal with this force majeure and even support some of our suppliers frankly, as we have some of this plant come online as well as our customers.

Ameet Thakkar - BMO Capital Markets - Analyst

Great, thanks for that guys.

Sanjay Shrestha - Chief Strategy Officer

Thank you.

Andy Marsh - President and Chief Executive Officer

I think that is our last call for the day. And I'd like to end it where my personal remarks ended. Plug is creating the new world today with our real products and the energy transition is going to happen faster than people thought, even just a week or two ago. And I would tell you there is no one in a better position because of all the years of experience, because of our hydrogen ecosystem we built, to take advantage of this change. That's who Plug is and really looking forward to talking to you more throughout the year. So thank you everyone.

Operator

[Operator's Closing Remarks]

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