BASF, Toda Kogyo target N America auto battery market

HOUSTON (ICIS)–BASF is in talks with Japan’s Toda Kogyo on collaborating in cathode active materials (CAM) and precursors in North America, the US affiliate of the German chemicals major said on Tuesday.

The collaboration would focus on manufacturing a broad range of CAM and precursors in North America for use in lithium-ion batteries for the automotive, consumer electronics and stationary storage markets.

Last year, the companies set up a new company, BASF Toda Battery Materials, to provide CAM for lithium-ion batteries in Japan. The collaboration in North America would create synergies on a global scale.

Tadashi Kubota, chairman of Toda Kogyo, added that the automotive lithium-ion battery market was still in its infancy, with 30% growth/year expected in coming years

Toda is specialised in the wet synthesis technology of metal oxide and the manufacturing of lithium-ion battery materials, among other related products.

The automotive industry is a major global consumer of petrochemicals which contributes more than a third of the raw material costs of an average vehicle. ICIS tracks the movement of petrochemical raw material costs in auto production both globally and regionally with the weighted ICIS Basket of Automotive Petrochemicals (IBAP).

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