Beijing is loosening restrictions for foreign EV battery manufacturers?
China is changing its approach to foreign EV lithium-ion battery manufacturers like Japan’s Panasonic and South Korean LG Chem/Samsung SDI.
A few years ago, new investments in production plants were affected by Chinese policy, favoring domestic manufacturers.
To receive subsidies for electric cars, batteries were required to be supplied by companies from an accredited list. Those who didn’t catch onto the list needed to produce batteries for export or for other industries, because such batteries were not competitive in the case of EVs.
According to Nikkei, the Chinese government is now loosening restrictions, so foreign manufacturers are preparing more production capacity.
[related-news title=”See AlsoPanasonic’s
Panasonic’s production capacity is believed to be nearly 5 GWh the and company aims for an 80% increase in summer 2019 (by adding two production lines), which would be a total of 9 GWh annually. The Japanese manufacturer secured land for two more buildings at a factory in Dalian, Liaoning Province.
LG Chem apparently aims to build new facilities in Nanjing by 2020 and be able to produce batteries for 500,000 New Energy Vehicles (no details about GWh).
On the other hand, two of the biggest Chinese players – CATL and BYD – hint at 50 GWh and 60 GWh respectively by 2020!
Source: Nikkei
Source: Electric Vehicle News
