“New company alliance wants to produce battery cells in Germany”

A consortium of German companies has made a fresh attempt to establish battery cell production in the country, Alfons Frese writes in Tagesspiegel. Plant manufacturers Thyssen-Krupp, M+W and Manz have teamed up with cell producers Litarion, Batteriemontagezentrum and Streetscooter to form a “germ cell” intended to serve as the basis for developing mass production over the coming years, Frese writes. Since 2008, about 400 million euros in public funds has gone into battery cell research, closing the research gap with respect to market leaders in South Korea and Japan and, increasingly, China, he writes. Germany’s car industry, a major buyer of batteries, has so far not signalled keen interest in independent production – “but this is likely to change as one out of four cars is expected to have an electric engine by 2025,” he explains.

Read the article in German here.

For further information, see the CLEW dossier The Energiewende and German carmakers.