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Sam Adham (SA), Head of Battery Materials, Economics, and Sustainability at CRU Group, speaks with Jeremy Weltman (JW) about Beijing’s Contemporary Amperex Technology Ltd (CATL) sending more than 2,000 workers to Spain to build a €4bn plant with Stellantis, and what it means for Europe’s EV ambitions.
SA: Battery manufacturing is an incredibly precise and complex process and Chinese companies want to avoid the leakage of technical know-how. CATL is transplanting its equipment and workers so that it can ramp up the factory quickly – where otherwise training and relying on a majority-local workforce would be too risky. Over time the idea is to phase out those workers and implement heavy automation.
The industry also needs joint ventures, as in the case of Stellantis and CATL. Both parties want partnerships to share the costs and risks.
There are some parallels with what happened in the auto industry in China years ago. Back then, the authorities in Beijing made it a rule that any Western car company wanting to set up in China had to form a joint venture with a local partner. The Chinese learnt from them, and slowly over time, they showed them the door. Now, Western car companies are on the decline in China. Europe and the West generally seem to think they can do the same thing in reverse, but with batteries, be open to Chinese entry and somehow benefit from it. But it’s unlikely to happen in the same way.
SA: Exactly. The idea is: come in, invest, we’ll even help you with local government funding, as long as you use local labour, pay taxes here, and share your technology over time.
But the CATL plant in Spain shows that isn’t happening. CATL is bringing almost all of the plant’s operational workforce from China. From the Chinese manufacturing perspective, it has to be that way – certainly initially. If you start changing process flows or factory parameters and operating procedures, you risk lower quality and higher defect rates. You end up needing to build more batteries just to make up for the losses.
So CATL’s approach is to transplant a Chinese factory into Spain – same people, same equipment, same methods. That’s the only way they can guarantee quality and efficiency.
SA: The Koreans faced the same challenge early on. LG’s plant in Poland, which supplies Volkswagen and other European carmakers, went through this too. They didn’t share their technology with the local workforce either, for the same reason: maintaining process integrity.
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By Adria Calatayud
STMicroelectronics and Sanan Optoelectronics said Wednesday that they are forming a semiconductor-manufacturing joint venture in China, with $3.2 billion in total build-out funding.
The European and Chinese semiconductor companies said they have signed an agreement to create a silicon-carbide-device manufacturing project in Chongqing, China, to tap into rising demand for semiconductors for car electrification as well as for industrial power and energy applications in the country. Production is expected to start in the fourth quarter of 2025, with full build-out anticipated in 2028, the companies said.
The expected $3.2 billion for the full build-out of the joint venture includes capital expenditures of about $2.4 billion over the next five years, which will be funded by contributions from STMicroelectronics and Sanan Optoelectronics, support from the local government and loans, the companies said.
Sanan will separately build a silicon-carbide-substrate manufacturing plant to fulfill the needs of the joint project, the companies said.
Completion of the project remains subject to regulatory approvals, STMicroelectronics and Sanan said.
Write to Adria Calatayud at adria.calatayud@dowjones.com
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Renault SA and China’s Geely say they plan to launch a joint venture to produce gasoline-powered and hybrid powertrains, adding to a series of partnerships between global automakers to share soaring technology costs
BEIJING — Renault SA and China’s Geely announced plans Tuesday for a jointly owned venture to produce gasoline-powered and hybrid powertrains, adding to a series of partnerships between global automakers to share soaring technology costs.
The venture will have 17 plants with annual production capacity of 5 million powertrains, five research and development centers on three continents and some 19,000 employees, the companies said. They gave no financial terms but said each partner will own half of the venture.
It will supply brands owned by or linked to Renault and Geely including Nissan, Mitsubishi, Volvo Cars, Renault, Dacia, Geely Auto, Lynk & Co. and Proton, the companies said. They said it might later supply third-party brands.
Global automakers have been forming partnerships over the past decade to share the multibillion-dollar development costs of electric vehicles and more efficient gasoline engines.
The Renault-Geely agreement will “enable the creation of a global leader in hybrid technologies to provide highly efficient advanced solutions for automakers around the world,” Eric Li, chairman of Geely Holding Group, said in a statement.
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Heading into this past week, uranium miner
Cameco
was that rare stock in the market: It had posted a double-digit gain in 2022. One deal made those gains disappear—and created a buying opportunity.
At first glance, there didn’t seem to be all that much that was controversial about the joint venture Cameco (ticker: CCJ) announced this past Tuesday. Along with
Brookfield Renewable Partners
(BEP), Cameco agreed to buy Westinghouse Electric, a servicer to nuclear power plants, for $7.88 billion, including debt. Cameco will own 49% of the joint venture once the deal is completed.
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TOKYO — A new electric car company that brings together two big names in Japanese business, Honda and Sony, officially kicked off Thursday, with both sides stressing their common values of taking up challenges and serving people’s needs.
The electric vehicle from Sony Honda Mobility Inc. will go on sale in 2025, with deliveries coming first in the U.S. in early 2026, and in Japan later that year, Chief Executive Yasuhide Mizuno told reporters. Pre-orders start 2025.
In March, Sony Group Corp. and Honda agreed to set up the 50-50 joint venture, with the idea of bringing together Honda’s expertise in autos, mobility technology and sales with Sony’s imaging, network, sensor and entertainment expertise.
Production will take place at a Honda plant in the U.S., but details such as pricing, platform and the kind of battery to be used were not disclosed. Production volume was also not given, but officials said this was a special model and not intended for massive sales.
Mizuno, who is from Honda Motor Co., said the collaboration brings together hardware and software to deliver an emotionally satisfying experience on the move.
“It was necessary to take a totally new approach,” Mizuno told reporters in Tokyo. “We want to make this completely new.”
The U.S. was chosen for the launch because electric vehicles were already popular there, Japan came second as Honda’s home market, and other markets, including Europe, will follow, but no dates were set, he said.
Izumi Kawanishi, the Sony executive who became Chief Operating Officer at Sony Mobility, said partners will be added to the project.
Demand for “zero-emissions” vehicles is expected to grow worldwide amid concerns about climate change and sustainability.
Sony, which makes the PlayStation video-game console and has movie and music businesses, showed an electric car concept at the CES gadget show in Las Vegas two years ago, and has been eager to find an auto partner.
Honda has electric vehicles in its lineup, although not as plentiful as do some rivals, like Ford Motor Co. or Nissan Motor Co. Tokyo-based Honda has teamed up with General Motors to share platforms for EVs in North America, but the products are not yet on sale.
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Yuri Kageyama is on Twitter https://twitter.com/yurikageyama
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