Electric vehicle maker Tesla is recruiting Chinese and Korean materials suppliers to help lower the cost and boost the energy of its newest battery cells, Reuters reports.
The report stated people familiar with the plans said the US company has struggled with battery-related performance and production issues, delaying the launch of its Cybertruck lorry.
It said Tesla has turned to China’s Ningbo Ronbay New Energy and Suzhou Dongshan Precision Manufacturing to help cut materials costs as it boosts production of 4680 battery cells in the US.
The EV maker needs to fix the performance and process kinks to meet its ambitious production targets, and the 4680 could be the key to this, the report said. It added the 4680 has not hit energy density targets and Tesla is still having issues dry-coating the cathode.
