TCC to Invest $350 Million in New Gigafactory

Entering the electric vehicle market, Taiwan Cement Corporation (TCC) decided to set up the first Gigafactory in Taiwan. TCC’s board of directors passed a resolution on 19th to invest NT$ 10 billion dollars in TCC Recycle Energy Technology Company. (TCC Recycle)

TCC pointed out that E-ONE MOLI ENERGY CORP. (Molicel), a subsidiary of the TCC Group, is expected to set up Taiwan’s first Gigafactory at the former site of TCC’s Kaohsiung Xiaogang Paper Mill, which will mainly produce high-end, high-capacity, high rate charge/discharge Lithium NCA battery with a production capacity of 1.8GWh, equivalent to the production amount of long-range batteries for 24,000 electric vehicles a year. The current annual production capacity of Molicel’s Tainan plant is 1.5GWh.

TCC Recycle is the parent company of E-ONE MOLI. TCC indicated that E-ONE MOLI is now the largest lithium battery manufacturer in Taiwan and a major supplier of many well-known high-end home appliances brands in Europe and United States. However, the equipment purchased three years ago is no longer suffice for the next-generation battery manufacturing process. Therefore, there was an important decision to set up a new factory in Kaohsiung and increase TCC’s capital by 10 billion NTD.

The global demand for high-performance batteries is rising rapidly. Last year, a total of 80 million passenger cars produced globally, of which Tesla only produced nearly 500,000 vehicles due to insufficient battery supply.

TCC Chairman Nelson An-ping Chang (張安平) said that mobile energy is the most important high-tech development in the future world, in which batteries play a key role. Modern lives are full of sockets, people are limited by various kinds of connection imperceptibly. In the future, with the development of super batteries, there is a chance to rid of the traditional connection form and embrace infinite possibilities.

 

工商時報 記者袁延壽報導