Panasonic Opens Lithium-Ion Battery Plant in China
Panasonic Corp. has opened a lithium-ion battery cell manufacturing plant in Dalian, China—the company’s first such facility in the country.
Panasonic Corp. has opened a lithium-ion battery cell manufacturing plant in Dalian, China—the company’s first such facility in the country.
The 861,000-sq-ft facility is part of the Japanese supplier’s Panasonic Automotive Energy Dalian Co. joint venture with Dalian Levear Electric Co. About 500 people are expected to work at the plant.
Panasonic also is increasing production of lithium-ion batteries in Japan and is ramping up output with Tesla Inc. at their “gigafactory” plant near Reno, Nev., to meet growing global demand for hybrid and electric vehicles.
Last year Panasonic projected it would double its automobile battery sales to 400 billion yen ($4 billion) in the fiscal year ending March 2019 compared with fiscal 2016 levels. The company is targeting sales of 2 trillion yen ($17.8 billion) overall for its automotive business for the same period, up from 1.3 trillion yen ($12 billion) in the fiscal year that began April 1.
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