Battery materials recycler Li-Cycle Corp has appointed Dawei Li to the role of vice-president of the company’s Asia business and its board of advisors to deliver management advisory services to the Canadian firm’s senior management team.
Focused on the Asian market, Li (pictured) will oversee the Canada firm’s team, business development, and commercial lithium-ion battery recycling facility rollout across the continent.
Li says he plans to leverage his experience with directing global teams to facilitate Li-Cycle’s expansion in a region that is experiencing “prolific growth of electrification and lithium-ion batteries”.
He will report directly to Li-Cycle’s co-founder and chief executive officer, Ajay Kochhar.
Kochhar said: “The Asian lithium-ion battery market is the world’s largest, presenting a considerable supply of battery manufacturing scrap as well as lithium-ion batteries that are approaching their end-of-life and will need to be recycled.
“Li will play a major role in our global growth plans by spearheading our expansion in Asia. Asia is one of the key components of our broader global rollout plan over the next five years and beyond.”
Prior to joining Li-Cycle, Li served as the global business director for Lithium Carbonate at the Albemarle Corporation.
Li-Cycle is set to debut as a publicly traded company in the US and expand its operations into Asia, in addition to other regions.
Board of advisors
John Mitchell and Govind Arora were asked to join the company’s board of advisors because of their “experience and expertise” in business development, commercial support and strategic and business planning.
Both are partners and co-founders of Blue Horizon Advisors and Blue Horizon Capital, which support companies to scale and provide index-based investment products across the new energy economy.
The other members of the board of advisors are Dr. Yuan Gao and Dr. Ahmad Ghahreman, who provide technical advisory services.
Mitchell comes from the specialty chemicals, energy materials, utility infrastructure, and industrial gases industries.
He has previously served as president of lithium for the Albemarle Corporation, where he guided its lithium division.
Arora was previously chief commercial officer for Albemarle Corporation’s lithium business.
Dr. Gao is vice-chairman of the board of directors of Qinghai Taifeng Pulead Lithium-Energy Technology Co. Ltd. (Pulead), one of China’s leading lithium-ion battery cathode producers.
Dr. Ghahreman has more than 15 years of hydrometallurgical/wet chemistry experience.
