Northvolt’s Bankruptcy … What Does This Mean for Europe’s EV Goals?

Northvolt, a company that was central to Europe’s electric vehicle battery production, has filed for bankruptcy. This could be a major setback to Europe’s ambitions of becoming a strong player in the EV market. What does this mean for the future of EV production in Europe and the push for sustainability?

The company’s court filing on Thursday said it had capacity to produce 300,000 batteries a year.

This is tough. 300k is very small. I’m surprised Volkswagen is even trying to support them now.

Avi said:

The company’s court filing on Thursday said it had capacity to produce 300,000 batteries a year.

This is tough. 300k is very small. I’m surprised Volkswagen is even trying to support them now.

Cells or packs?

@Peyton
It has to be cells. If they were making packs, they wouldn’t be struggling this much, and I don’t think they even produce packs.

Avi said:
@Peyton
It has to be cells. If they were making packs, they wouldn’t be struggling this much, and I don’t think they even produce packs.

If you Google it, you’ll find that 300,000 is the vehicle capacity for Northvolt. So it’s probably cells for 300,000 cars. With their 6,500 staff, this seems low. That would only be around 46 packs per year, but I’m not sure if that’s a lot or not.

@Adler
I did some more digging: This Reuters article has more details:

A Reuters review of internal production sheets, company documents, and conversations with sources indicate Northvolt continues to face challenges in boosting production levels for battery cells. For example, in the week starting Oct. 21, the company delivered just 22,000 cells shippable against a target of 30,000. In the week ending Nov. 10, the company delivered more than 20,000 shippable cells.

So they’re delivering around 22k cells a week, which means a run-rate of 1.2 million cells per year.

Seems like the 300k figure might be referring to vehicle capacity and not actual capacity. At the 1.2M rate, it would be enough for several thousand packs or vehicles each year.

@Avi
Yeah, Northvolt’s a large-scale startup. Saying they’re ‘too small’ misses that the real issue is ramping up production while meeting target quality.

@Avi
Their long-term goal is to produce 100k cells a week. 300k cells is nothing compared to their target capacity.

Avi said:

The company’s court filing on Thursday said it had capacity to produce 300,000 batteries a year.

This is tough. 300k is very small. I’m surprised Volkswagen is even trying to support them now.

If each battery cell is 1kWh, that’s only 300MWh of manufacturing capacity. How much money has Northvolt spent over the years?

@Barbara1
The cost per cell is probably really high too.

When I saw BMW’s massive cancellation because Northvolt couldn’t deliver the batteries on time, I was worried. The liquidity issue looks bad. Really unfortunate.

Sloan said:
When I saw BMW’s massive cancellation because Northvolt couldn’t deliver the batteries on time, I was worried. The liquidity issue looks bad. Really unfortunate.

BMW canceled because they switched to cylindrical cells, not because of delivery issues. But they did move to cylindrical cells made by Chinese manufacturers.

@Masitsa
I think BMW canceled because Northvolt couldn’t deliver the prismatic cells on time, in the quantity and quality BMW expected. By the time they could, BMW had already moved to cylindrical cells. Samsung has stepped in to take Northvolt’s place.

@Luca
Sorry, I know you’re really into BMW, so I won’t go into more details haha.

I think this outcome didn’t surprise anyone.

Kai said:
I think this outcome didn’t surprise anyone.

#WumaoLife

I thought Northvolt was going to start producing Sodium Ion Batteries next year…

Good news.

Bad company, poorly run, and funded by ESG money. I’m glad Swedish politicians didn’t bail them out. And it’s ridiculous to think that Europe, which has no materials to make batteries, should build battery factories.

@Emory
Where did you get that information? I want to avoid bad companies too.

Peyton said:
@Emory
Where did you get that information? I want to avoid bad companies too.

It’s easy, just avoid any high-ranking ESG companies.

ESG is a scam.