LAKE ORION—American Battery Solutions Inc., a new company, announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire manufacturing and testing assets for high-voltage battery systems from Robert Bosch Battery Systems, a unit of the German manufacturing giant Robert Bosch GmbH.
Terms of the sale will not be disclosed, officials of the two companies said.
ABS is founded by a longtime battery technology developer Subhash Dhar, and by KCK Group, a New York City family investment firm. Officials said KCK Group has committed more than $50 million in capital to the enterprise.
Under the proposed agreement with Bosch, ABS will acquire testing lab assets for high-voltage battery systems and will lease 40,000 square feet of space for prototype battery pack assembly and offices in Lake Orion. ABS is also buying a 172,000-square-foot factory in Springboro, Ohio, where Robert Bosch Battery Systems has assembled lithium-ion battery packs for the auto industry since 2009.
“We are proud to offer capabilities to the market through the acquisition of high-voltage assets,” said Dhar, a former CEO of several battery and electric vehicle companies, including Michigan’s pioneering Ovonic Battery Co.
Also joining ABS are John Warner, chairman of the industry trade group NAATBatt International and a former executive with battery and energy companies, as chief customer officer; Ivan Menjak, a former marketing executive at several battery companies, as vice president, business development and Arun Kumar, a veteran battery research and development engineer, as director of electronics.
“ABS brings an experienced team of world-class battery professionals and automotive experts with an entrepreneurial mindset together with world-class development and manufacturing facilities and teams,” Dhar said. ABS will have more than 50 experienced experts and associates between the two locations.
ABS will supply modular battery systems to transportation, industrial and commercial markets, primarily in North America and Europe. It will partner with the world’s leading automakers, system integrators and battery manufacturers to supplement and extend their brands with a combination of engineering, testing and manufacturing services. The venture will partner with leading cell manufacturers, to offer a variety of chemistries and cell form factors to optimize each application.
“We will leverage our significant automotive experience to bring electrified mobility battery systems to new emerging transportation, industrial and commercial segments,” Dhar said. “We see tremendous opportunity for growth in robust battery systems with flexible business models as the business cases in these new segments are enabled with lower cost lithium ion batteries.” Dhar said.
Target applications will include high-performance and autonomous electric vehicles; delivery trucks, buses, and utility vehicles; the rail and marine sectors; mobile commercial power; materials handling equipment; and construction, agriculture, and mining equipment.
IDTechEx, a market research firm, forecasts that the electric vehicle market will reach $1.1 trillion in sales by 2028, including the construction, agriculture and mining markets, which will reach more than $100 billion by 2029, as the prices of lithium-ion batteries decrease and enable
More at https://www.americanbatterysolutions.com/.