A view shows the Fiat Panda in Kragujevac, Serbia
(Reuters) -Stellantis announced on Tuesday that it had reached an agreement with China's CATL to create a joint venture for the construction of a low-cost lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) battery gigafactory in Zaragoza, Spain.
The joint venture, owned equally by Stellantis and CATL, will be supported by an investment of up to 4.1 billion euros, the press release said.
“Scheduled to begin production by the end of 2026 at the Stellantis site in Zaragoza, Spain, the plant could reach a capacity of up to 50 GWh, depending on the evolution of the electricity market in Europe and the continued support from the Spanish authorities and the European Union”, specify the two groups.
The transaction is expected to be finalized during 2025.
In November 2023, Stellantis announced that it was considering such a project to produce in Europe this battery technology that is less energy dense, but more affordable than NMC (Nickel-Manganese-Cobalt), in order to lower the selling price of electric vehicles ( VE) and prepare for Chinese competition.
Stellantis is currently considering which European factories it will attribute its future STLA Small electric vehicle architecture to. The Zaragoza assembly plant currently produces the Citroën C3 Aircross and the Opel Crossland and Corsa.
GEOGRAPHICAL EXPANSION
CATL's Spanish gigafactory will be the Chinese group's third in Europe, with the other two sites fully owned by it.
It already operates a factory in Germany, its first on European soil, where it has invested 1.8 billion euros and is targeting a capacity of 14 GWh, and is also building a new gigafactory in Hungary with an investment of 7.3 billion euros and a planned capacity of up to 100 GWh.
In an interview with Reuters in November, CATL President Robin Zeng indicated that these two sites would be profitable from 2025 and 2026 respectively.
The Chinese group is currently in a major phase of geographic expansion. On the American market, it has so far restricted its presence to licensed production agreements but says it is ready to go further if the Trump administration opens the door.
Last spring, the battery manufacturer Automotive Cells Company (ACC), a joint venture of Stellantis, Mercedes and TotalEnergies, which produces NMC in the North of France, interrupted its two other gigafactory projects in Germany and France. Italy as part of a reflection on the future choice of battery chemistry and in the face of the slowdown in the EV market.
ACC declared on Tuesday that this new Stellantis-CATL project was complementary to its own, and that it was still considering the best way to develop low-cost chemistry and to adapt its industrial and technological roadmap accordingly.
“ACC will confirm its plans in this area in the first half of 2025, with the renewed strategic and financial support of its shareholders,” added the battery joint venture.
(Written by Noémie Naudin, with Gilles Guillaume, edited by Augustin Turpin and Blandine Hénault)
