According to Bloomberg, solid-state battery manufacturer Quantumscape (QS Corporation) has announced that semiconductor industry veteran Sivaram will take over as the group's CEO, and former CEO Jagdeep Singh will step down after 13 years in the position and will continue to serve as chairman of the board.
Sivaram, who has extensive experience in the semiconductor and data storage sectors, joined QS as President in September 2023 and previously served as President of Technology and Strategy at Western Digital. Prior to joining Western Digital, Sivaram Hai served as Executive Vice President of SanDisk Memory Technology.
QS Company: Cooperated with Volkswagen and attracted the attention of the capital market
QS was founded in 2010 and is headquartered in California, USA. The company focuses on the R&D and commercialization of solid-state battery technology, which is considered one of the important breakthroughs in next-generation battery technology and is highly anticipated for its higher energy density, faster charging speed, and longer lifespan.
For a long time, the strategic cooperation between QS and Volkswagen has attracted much attention. In 2018, Volkswagen invested US$100 million to become QS's largest shareholder and announced a joint production project. In June 2020, Volkswagen made another $200 million investment in QS to help it build a solid-state battery production line by 2025.
Since then, QS has continued to improve the technology. On October 25, 2023, QS updated the solid-state battery test data, and the battery capacity of the A0 sample is about 38ah, a total of 24 layers of pole pieces, the positive surface capacity is 31mah square centimeter. After 1000 cycles, the test was carried out under conditions of C3 charge and C2 discharge with 95% capacity retention.
As time passed, the results of QS's partnership with Volkswagen began to appear. In December 2022, QS delivered the first samples of a 24-layer solid-state battery to its automotive partners, including the Volkswagen Group. A year later, in January 2024, QS's all-solid-state battery passed Volkswagen's 500,000 km endurance test.
In terms of capital markets, QS's cooperation with Volkswagen and other car companies has also brought more business opportunities and market recognition, which in turn affects its performance in the capital market, attracting many investors such as Bill Gates, SAIC, Continental, Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, and Qatar Investment Authority.
Now, with Siva Sivaram taking over as CEO of QS, it is expected to drive QS's strategic layout and business expansion in the field of solid-state battery technology, and increase investor confidence in the company's future growth. It is also expected to further strengthen QS's relationship with partners such as Volkswagen and lay the foundation for future growth.
Overseas solid-state battery companies have frequently reported personnel changes
In the field of overseas solid-state batteries, there have been frequent news of personnel changes recently. In addition to QS, SES, a lithium-metal solid-state battery manufacturer, also announced a major personnel change in January: Brian Krzanich, former CEO of Intel, joined the company's board of directors as an independent director.
Brian Krzanich is a semiconductor industry leader with extensive experience commercializing automotive applications, leading Intel's expansion from the core CPU market to cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and autonomous driving. Dr. Qichao Hu, Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of SES, said Krzanich's expertise will bring significant value to SES' innovations in material discovery and manufacturing processes to improve battery performance and safety.
Founded in 2012, SES focuses on the development and manufacturing of high-performance lithium metal batteries and currently operates in Boston, Shanghai, and Seoul. In 2021, the company released the world's first automotive-grade lithium-metal battery A sample, and signed cooperation agreements with automakers such as Hyundai, General Motors, and Honda. In December 2023, SES announced that it had officially signed a lithium metal battery B sample agreement with an auto company, which is also the first time that the global lithium metal battery field has entered the B sample stage.
SES adopts a similar technical route to QS, using high-nickel ternary materials as the positive electrode and lithium metal as the negative electrode. However, the difference between the two is that SES aims to achieve mass production, so it uses a solid-liquid hybrid electrolyte (semi-solid) technology, while QS has always stuck with an all-solid-state electrolyte.
A series of recent personnel changes and business developments at SES and QS indicate that the solid-state battery space is becoming increasingly competitive. In this competitive environment, companies are responding to the challenges and trying to prepare for talent acquisition, technological innovation, and market expansion.
*: TrendForce Lithium.
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