Chinese carmaker BAIC Group and US-owned Chinese battery firm Funeng Technology (Ganzhou) are to invest a total of CNY10 billion ($1.2bn) to launch a batteries plant for new energy vehicles in Shunyi, Bejing.
The Shunyi district government said it has given the go-ahead for BAIC and Funeng to manufacture battery cells and battery packs with an annual production capacity of 8GWh.
The new plants are eventually expected to generate sales of around CNY10bn ($1.5bn) each year.
Funeng, a ternary lithium automotive battery supplier for new energy vehicles, was founded in Jiangxi Province in 2009. The company is wholly owned by start-up Farasis Energy— a San Francisco Bay-based developer and supplier of lithium-ion battery technologies for a range of markets, including transportation, electric grid, and commercial and industrial vehicles.
Last May, Farasis won two advanced electric vehicle (EV) battery development/manufacturing contracts worth a total of more than $7 million from The United States Advanced Battery Consortium LLC (USABC) to develop high-energy density, low cost lithium-ion cell technology.
