107 Ah Li-Metal battery marks a major milestone in demonstrating commercial readiness of Li-Metal battery technology for EV market
BOSTON – SES (formerly known as SolidEnergy Systems), a global leader in the development and initial production of high-performance hybrid lithium-metal (Li-Metal) rechargeable batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) and other applications, today announced Apollo™, a 107 Ah Li-Metal battery that is the largest in the world and a breakthrough for the automotive industry. This is also the world’s first 100 plus Ah Li-Metal battery ever demonstrated. SES also announced the largest Li-Metal facility in the world – the Shanghai Giga, a new 300,000 square-foot facility being built in Shanghai, China and scheduled for completion in 2023.
The announcements were made at SES Battery World, the company’s inaugural Battery World virtual event taking place in the United States on November 3 and in South Korea and China on November 4.
In July 2021, SES announced plans to list on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) through a merger with Ivanhoe Capital Acquisition Corp. (NYSE: IVAN) (“Ivanhoe Capital”). Upon the closing of the transaction, the combined company will be listed on the NYSE under the new ticker symbol “SES.”
Apollo™ can deliver 107 Ah, weighs only 0.982 kg, and has an energy density of 417 Wh/kg and 935 Wh/L. Apollo™ also demonstrated similarly high capacity and energy density when tested at C/10 (10-hour discharge), C/3 (3-hour discharge), and 1C (1-hour discharge) at room temperature.
“There’s a race among leading global carmakers and next-generation battery suppliers to develop and demonstrate the world’s first 100 Ah Li-Metal battery. Today we did it. We will continue to work with our OEM partners to optimize this battery and bring it to commercial production. We are confident that we and our OEM partners will win this race, and be the first to commercialize this next generation Li-Metal battery,” said Dr. Qichao Hu, founder and CEO, SES (formerly known as SolidEnergy Systems). “These batteries will need to go through further testing and optimization, but we are very excited about the performance that they have shown. Batteries need to be capable of delivering high energy density over a wide range of temperature and power density. A car needs to work in hot and cold environments and perform seamlessly when driven fast or slowly. Solid-state batteries can never achieve this performance at the level of our hybrid Li-Metal batteries.”
SES also introduced its 3 parallel development tracks: Hermes™ (platform for material development), Apollo™ (engineering capability for large automotive cells), and Avatar™ (AI-powered safety software to monitor battery health).
SES is working with GM and Hyundai to deliver practical automotive A samples next year, and aim to start commercialization of Li-Metal batteries in 2025. SES is the only company that has entered into automotive A-sample joint development with automakers for Li-Metal batteries.
Expanding for Future Growth
Dr. Hu also unveiled an aerial image of SES’s new Shanghai Giga. Scheduled for completion in 2023, the Shanghai Giga will be a 300,000 square-foot facility located in the “auto city” Jiading, Shanghai, capable of producing 1 GWh of Li-Metal batteries annually, by far the largest Li-Metal facility on the planet.
“The industry doesn’t need another battery breakthrough. What the world needs is someone who can take a battery breakthrough and make it work, truly, practically and completely, and then scale it up into hundreds of thousands and millions of vehicles. That’s what we’re here to do,” said Hu.
“Of all the public claims of new battery technologies, SES is the first which I am aware of to achieve large cell format Lithium metal anodes,” said Bob Galyen, Owner of Galyen Energy LLC and Former CTO of CATL. “With SES’s unique electrolyte-salt combination they have created a cell which has superior safety, impressive performance, achieved respectable life and utilizes nearly the same manufacturing processes as used by the Lithium-Ion manufacturers today.”
“We looked at a wide array of battery companies and SES has by far the most advanced next-generation battery technologies and is the closest to commercializing those technologies in electric vehicles,” said Robert Friedland, Chairman and CEO, Ivanhoe Capital Acquisition and Founder and Executive Co-Chairman, Ivanhoe Mines.
