European automotive giant Stellantis Group announces investment in sodium-ion batteries

According to news on January 12, European automotive giant Stellantis Group announced today that its corporate venture capital fund "Stellantis Ventures" will make a strategic investment in Tiamat. Tiamat is a France-based company that develops and commercializes sodium-ion battery technology.

Sodium-ion technology can provide a lower cost per kilowatt-hour and does not contain lithium and cobalt. It is also a solution currently deployed by many car companies, such as BYD, JAC, etc., and is expected to replace lead-acid batteries in electric bicycles.

Stellantis Group stated that Tiamat is one of the 11 best-performing start-up technology companies that won the "Stellantis Ventures 2023 Annual Awards" and is also the first company in the world to have recently commercialized sodium ion technology in an electrified product.

Electrification is a key pillar of the Stellantis Group’s “Dare Forward 2030” strategic plan. Its main goals include: by 2030, all passenger cars sold by the Group in Europe will be pure electric vehicles, and all passenger cars sold in the United States will be pure electric vehicles. 50% of the cars and light trucks are pure electric vehicles.

In order to achieve the above sales targets, Stellantis Group will secure a battery capacity reserve of approximately 400GWh. Stellantis Group plans to become a net-zero carbon emissions company in 2038. If all its direct and indirect carbon emissions are included, only a single-digit percentage of the group's carbon emissions will require carbon offsets.

In order to support the achievement of the above goals, Stellantis Group has signed a series of relevant important agreements globally to ensure the supply of raw materials required by the group to produce electric vehicles by 2027. Stellantis Group is also investing in the development of alternative energy storage technologies, including solid-state batteries with Factorial Energy, lithium-sulfur chemistry batteries with Lyten and sodium-ion batteries with Tiamat.

Tiamat, a spin-off of the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), will use the funds obtained from this round of financing, including investment from Stellantis Ventures, to start the construction of a sodium-ion battery factory in France. The plant will initially produce equipment related to power tools and stationary storage, with plans to later expand production of second-generation products for pure electric vehicles.