Svolt Energy previously had a plant in Germany for the production of battery packs.
Svolt Energy, the power battery maker that spun off from Great Wall Motor, will build a battery cell plant for the European market in Lauchhammer, Brandenburg, Germany, the company announced on its official WeChat account on September 9.
The plant will be Svolt Energy's first battery cell plant for overseas markets and its second overseas plant. It previously owned a battery pack plant in Heusweiler, Saarland, Germany.
(Image credit: Svolt Energy)
The facility previously served as a wind turbine manufacturing facility for wind power giant Vestas, and Svolt Energy will upgrade it with plans already in the works, the power cell maker said.
Svolt Energy's investment will not only give the Vestas plant a new life, but will also contribute to the structural optimization of the electric vehicle industry in the Brandenburg region, said Brandenburg state premier Dietmar Woidke.
The area around Lauchhammer, and Brandenburg as a whole, has been forming a cluster for innovative electric vehicle development in recent years, which is an important reason why Svolt Energy is locating its second project abroad in the region, the company said.
Many companies in Svolt Energy's supply chain and battery lifecycle are located in the region -- such as globally known materials giant BASF, which entered into a partnership with it in late 2021 to work together on battery materials and their recycling, the company said.
Svolt Energy plans to produce the cells at its Lauchhammer-based facility and process them into packs at its plant in Heusweiler, according to the company.
Lauchhammer's location advantage helps Svolt Energy serve current customers' projects in a timely manner and meet its expansion capacity goals in Europe more quickly, it said.
Svolt Energy became independent from Great Wall Motor's power battery division in February 2018 to work on next-generation battery materials, cells, modules, pack, BMS, and energy storage technologies.
In August 2021, the company announced that its first cobalt-free battery rolled off the production line in mass production, and was the first such product in the world to come out of the lab and into mass production.
On July 19 of this year, Svolt Energy announced that its all-solid-state battery lab had developed China's first 20Ah-class sulfide all-solid-state prototype cells with an energy density of 350-400 Wh/kg.
Once the cells are mass-produced, they could enable electric vehicles to achieve a range of more than 1,000 kilometers, Svolt Energy said at the time.
Svolt Energy is one of China's largest power cell manufacturers, ranking sixth in August with a 2.49 percent market share in the country, according to data released earlier this month by the China Automotive Battery Innovation Alliance.
Svolt Energy is also one of the world's largest power battery makers, with a 1.3 percent share in January-July, ranking 10th, according to Seoul-based SNE Research.
