korea

South Korea’s SK Innovation (SKI) is reportedly in talks to establish two separate battery production joint ventures— one with Volkswagen and another with Chinese partners.

SKI confirmed talks with Volkswagen in an interview with Reuters, saying the two companies were discussing building a factory together. SKI also said I was “on the cusp” of agreeing plans to build a plant in China with “undisclosed partners”.

The president of SKI’s batteries business YS Yoon told Reuters: “Our strategy is to keep up with technological advancement by having relationships with some of our key customers. Compared with rivals, we’ve been matching or exceeding investment in the (EV batteries) area since last year.”

Korean electronics giant Samsung is to invest US$2.4 billion in order to expand battery manufacturing in Tianjin, northern China, according to a report by the state-run Xinhua News Agency.

The Tianjin municipal government has reported that the investment will be used to expand the power battery lines for automotive batteries, and to establish a multi-layer ceramics capacitors (MLCC) factory in the city.

Tianjin is already a well-established manufacturing base for Samsung, with 10 affiliated companies currently in the municipality, pumping out products reportedly worth a combined total of around CNY84bn ($12.2bn) annually.