Report: LG wants to control electric-vehicle battery market

LG is your quintessential household brand name, dominating the mobile phone and home appliance markets. The 64 year-old conglomerate out of South Korea is now setting its sights on bigger game; the automotive battery industry. LG is no newcomer in the EV game, but it has now established itself as the owner of the world’s largest EV battery-making plant, with the opening of a new facility in Ochang, South Korea. The plant, managed by LG Chem, a division of LG, is said to going to produce enough EV lithium-ion batteries to outfit over 100,000 EVs.

LG Chem’s goal is to hold a 25% market share of the very fragmented market place by 2015. The company is also adding two factories, another in South Korea, and one in the US, in order to reach its goal of producing enough batteries for 350,000 vehicles by 2013.

“They’re definitely the mover and the shaker right now in the lithium-ion battery market,” said John Gartner, senior analyst at Pike Research. “They have strong relationships with GM, Ford and Hyundai, and their technology is viewed as being very stable, safe, and reliable, so it’s not out of the questions that they could reach that goal.”

Regardless of the attainability of the company’s goals, there is no question that LG’s investment will be a strong catalyst in driving the price of the technology down while rapidly advancing its state.

– By: Stephen Calogera

Source: AutoObserver