By Yoon Sung-won
SK Innovation strives to develop a battery by 2020 that will power an electric vehicle (EV) so it will go 500 kilometers on a single charge to break through the current technological bottleneck of around 350 kilometers, it said Sunday.
The bold plan came amid concerns about the Chinese government's discrimination against Korean battery makers in its subsidy policy as a part of its retaliation against Korea's deployment of a U.S. missile defense system.
SK Innovation plans to expedite upgrading its battery technology to prepare for new opportunities in the Chinese market in 2020 when the country's subsidy program for EVs will expire.
"We will achieve the 500km range by applying our exclusive technologies while developing new materials and manufacturing methods," said Lee Yong-woo, management and planning manager at SK Innovation's battery, information & electronics materials division.
The company currently is capable of making batteries that power an EV to run about 350km with a single charge. Expectations have been that the demand for EVs will come in scale once battery technology is ripe to make EVs run about 400 to 500km on one charge.
Korean battery makers have faced difficulties in China as its government escalated its trade retaliation.
Early last year, the Chinese government introduced its rule on EV battery makers that forces them to have a certain level of qualification in manufacturing, development and product quality. In November, it abruptly strengthened the criteria in manufacturing capacity by 40 times.
Korea's major battery producers LG Chem and Samsung SDI, which jointly run battery plants under cooperation with local businesses in Nanjing and Xian, respectively, failed to meet the new standards.
Consequently, the two global battery leaders have lost deals with Chinese EV makers because their government would not provide subsidies if they continued to use batteries that do not meet its standards.
That seems to be the case for SK Innovation, which established a joint battery assembly plant in Beijing with Beijing Electronics and Beijing Automotive in 2013. It has churned out cells in its factory in Seosan, South Chungcheong Province, and packed them in its Beijing plant.
Against this backdrop, its plant stopped operating in January to prompt rumors that the measure is related to China's retaliatory measures against Korean companies, as its bigger rivals LG and Samsung also faltered there.
But SK Innovation denied such news, saying it was a business decision and the firm will concentrate on technology by widening its lead on Chinese companies by 2020. The company came up with a specific plan for its technological roadmap toward the 500km-range EV battery on Sunday.
"We will respond to the latest risks in China by pushing to raise our technology in battery capacity and charging," a source from SK Innovation said. "We will also make investments to prepare for the time when the Chinese market opens again in 2020 and full-scale competition starts there."
SK Innovation strives to develop a battery by 2020 that will power an electric vehicle (EV) so it will go 500 kilometers on a single charge to break through the current technological bottleneck of around 350 kilometers, it said Sunday.
The bold plan came amid concerns about the Chinese government's discrimination against Korean battery makers in its subsidy policy as a part of its retaliation against Korea's deployment of a U.S. missile defense system.
SK Innovation plans to expedite upgrading its battery technology to prepare for new opportunities in the Chinese market in 2020 when the country's subsidy program for EVs will expire.
"We will achieve the 500km range by applying our exclusive technologies while developing new materials and manufacturing methods," said Lee Yong-woo, management and planning manager at SK Innovation's battery, information & electronics materials division.
The company currently is capable of making batteries that power an EV to run about 350km with a single charge. Expectations have been that the demand for EVs will come in scale once battery technology is ripe to make EVs run about 400 to 500km on one charge.
Korean battery makers have faced difficulties in China as its government escalated its trade retaliation.
Early last year, the Chinese government introduced its rule on EV battery makers that forces them to have a certain level of qualification in manufacturing, development and product quality. In November, it abruptly strengthened the criteria in manufacturing capacity by 40 times.
Korea's major battery producers LG Chem and Samsung SDI, which jointly run battery plants under cooperation with local businesses in Nanjing and Xian, respectively, failed to meet the new standards.
Consequently, the two global battery leaders have lost deals with Chinese EV makers because their government would not provide subsidies if they continued to use batteries that do not meet its standards.
That seems to be the case for SK Innovation, which established a joint battery assembly plant in Beijing with Beijing Electronics and Beijing Automotive in 2013. It has churned out cells in its factory in Seosan, South Chungcheong Province, and packed them in its Beijing plant.
Against this backdrop, its plant stopped operating in January to prompt rumors that the measure is related to China's retaliatory measures against Korean companies, as its bigger rivals LG and Samsung also faltered there.
But SK Innovation denied such news, saying it was a business decision and the firm will concentrate on technology by widening its lead on Chinese companies by 2020. The company came up with a specific plan for its technological roadmap toward the 500km-range EV battery on Sunday.
"We will respond to the latest risks in China by pushing to raise our technology in battery capacity and charging," a source from SK Innovation said. "We will also make investments to prepare for the time when the Chinese market opens again in 2020 and full-scale competition starts there."
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