Electric vehicle battery startup Group14 announced on May 4 that it has completed a $400 million round of financing led by German car company Porsche.
Part of the funding will be used to build a second battery materials factory in eastern Washington state, just hours from the company's current plant in Woodinville, outside Seattle, the Group14 chief executive said.
The company's silicon-carbon anode material is a "transformative technology" that allows batteries to charge faster and store more power than batteries using graphite. Most of the anodes of lithium batteries currently used in electric vehicles are made of graphite, mainly from China, and a small part from Canada and Japan.
Since Group14's silicon-carbon anode material can increase the capacity of lithium batteries by as much as 50 percent, the company says that using their batteries, electric vehicles can maintain the same range as today by reducing the number of cells used, thereby reducing the cost of The overall cost and size of the battery pack.
Group14 said it would supply battery materials to Cellforce, a subsidiary of Porsche. In addition, they have also reached a supply agreement with another European battery manufacturer, InoBat, and the first batch of electric vehicle batteries using Group14 anode material will be put into production in 2023.
Group14 said its company's anode material has been tested by battery makers Storedot and Funeng Technology. Storedot batteries equipped with Group14's silicon carbon anode material can be charged to 80% capacity in 10 minutes, and this time may be further shortened to less than 5 minutes.
