UK lithium-ion battery tech firm Hyperdrive Innovation has signed a distribution deal to break into the Asian market through Taiwan’s Foxlink Group.
Sunderland-based Hyperdrive, which develops and manufactures technology for electric vehicles and energy storage systems, told BBB the deal is worth around GBP40 million over the course of the “long-term agreement”.
Under the terms of the agreement, Foxlink Automotive Technology will manufacture, sell and distribute Hyperdrive’s modular battery packs under Hyperdrive’s intellectual property rights across Asia.
The deal includes establishing a production facility in the Taipei area, although a Hyperdrive spokesperson said the exact size and location of the plant is yet to be decided.
“Initially, 20,000 units will be made at the new facility each year with the option to scale up if needed by using another Foxlink facility in China,” the spokesperson told BBB.
The current production capability at Hyperdrive’s facility in Sunderland is around 10,000 units annually.
Hyperdrive CEO Chris Pennison said the deal “is a major development for Hyperdrive and means our world-leading technology can now be delivered globally”.
“The agreement will give us a strategic foothold in Asia, one of the world’s fastest-growing regions and transform awareness of Hyperdrive,” Pennison said.
The Foxlink partnership gives Hyperdrive a strategic presence outside of Europe for the first time.
Foxlink produces connectors, cable assemblies, power management devices and battery packs for some of the world’s leading makers of communications devices, computers and consumer electronics. The group had revenues of almost $3 billion in 2016 and 63,000 employees as at the end of 2017.