Germany’s BMW Group is set to sign 10-year contracts to secure supplies of cobalt and lithium for production of electric vehicle batteries, the auto giant has told BBB.
A BMW spokesperson confirmed contracts would be signed with more than one supplier “in the near future”— but declined to name the firms involved.
Earlier this month, BMW’s procurement chief Markus Duesmann told Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung the firm’s long-term goal was to “secure supplies all the way down to the level of the mines”.
Last year, BMW pledged to work for a more sustainable and transparent cobalt supply chain for battery manufacturing.
BBB reported last month that BMW had formed a partnership to develop solid-state batteries for its electric vehicles with US-based start-up Solid Power.
The move came after BMW’s Chinese joint venture brand, BMW Brilliance, reportedly opened a “high-voltage automotive battery pack production centre” in China— will cells for the project supplied by China’s Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL).