| Automotive Energy Supply Corporation (AESC) | |
| Industry: | Electric vehicle battery |
| Founded: | 2007 |
| Founders: | --> |
| Hq Location City: | Yokohama |
| Hq Location Country: | Japan |
| Areas Served: | --> |
| Products: | ion-batteries |
| Owner: | Envision, Nissan, Tokin Corp. |
| Website: | https://www.aesc-group.com |
Automotive Energy Supply Corporation (AESC) is a manufacturer of lithium ion batteries for electric vehicles established 2007 as a joint venture between Nissan, and Tokin Corporation. Since 2018 Chinese company Envision is a strong partner in the joint venture.
In 2007 NEC Corporation, Nissan Motor Company, and NEC Tokin agreed to establish a lithium-ion battery company focused on development to production of batteries for electric vehicles; in 2008 the company was established with a capital of ¥1.5 billion ($14.3million) with a 51:42:7 Nissan:NEC:NEC TOKIN shareholding; the business was to establish a manufacturing site at Nissan's facility in Zama, Kanagawa c.2009, with an initial capacity of 13,000 units per year, rising to 65,000 units per year on an investment of ¥12 billion ($114.6 million). The plant was to be supplied with lithium manganese electrode from NEC TOKIN's factory in Sagamihara, Kanagawa; itself upgraded at a cost of ¥11 billion ($128 million). Initial markets were to be forklift trucks, followed by electric and hybrid vehicles manufactured by Nissan.
Initial production of the Lithium Manganese Oxide battery LMO was based on a manganese spinel cathode, with batteries formed from laminated cells. The battery (L3-10) was a unit of 13 Ah, 3.6 V with a power density of 2060 W/kg (2.5 V @ 20 °C).
In late 2008, the joint owners announced they were investing a further ¥100 billion ($1.1 billion) in AESC, establishing an additional factory to increase capacity for around 200,000 vehicles per year.Trial production at Zama began mid 2009.
In 2010, the Nissan Leaf electric vehicle began production, using batteries from AESC.
In 2014, AESC was the second largest electric vehicle battery manufacturer worldwide (after Panasonic), with 21% of the market. In late 2014 Reuters reported conflict within the Nissan / Renault carmaker alliance over sourcing of battery packs for its Nissan Motor Manufacturing UK and Nissan Smyrna Assembly Plant (USA) car battery plants due to lack of price competitiveness with rival cell manufacturer LG Chem - Nissan was reported to have signed contracts to take all of NEC's electrode production, irrespective of sales.
In 2016, Nissan decided to sell its 51% stake in AESC, preferring external suppliers. In December 2016, Carlos Ghosn explained that being tied to internal battery manufacturing did not allow for the flexibility of buying cheaper third party batteries.[1]
In mid 2017, Nissan announced it was to sell its battery businesses including AESC (including acquiring the 49% NEC stake) to Chinese investment company GSR Capital for ~$1 billion. However, this sale did not actually happen and after three delays was canceled in July 2018 as intended buyer GSR Capital did not complete funding for the sale.
In Aug 2018, Nissan announced sale of its electric car battery unit to Chinese renewable group Envision Group, while retaining a 25% stake. The sale included AESC as well as battery manufacturing plants in USA (Tennessee) and England (Sunderland 1.9 GWh capacity[2]). NEC's 49% stake was also to be sold to Envision.
In April 2019, the company announced plans to open a new 20 GWh capacity battery plant in Jiangyin a town in the northern district of Wuxi, Jiangsu, China, roughly triple its production capacity of 7.5GWh. Another production site is in Inner Mongolia at the Ordos-Envision Net Zero Industrial Park. The park is claimed to be world's first zero-carbon industrial cluster for hydrogen, batteries, battery storage and further green technologies.
European activities include a new EV 9 GWh factory will be built in Sunderland, England. Construction is underway for Envision AESC Giga 1, which represents an initial 9 GWh plant. Potential future-phase investment of £1.8bn could generate up to 25 GWh capacity and create 4,500 new high-value green jobs in the region by 2030, with another option for up to 35 GWh. Renault and Envision AESC confirmed in June 2021 the plan to set up a €2 billion ($2.4 billion) gigafactory in Douai, Northern France[4] close to Renault ElectriCity which would supply 9 GWh EV batteries by 2024 and 24 GWh of batteries by 2030.[5]
Envision AESC also presented the project of a new power battery "super factory" in Kentucky, with a planned production capacity of 30 GWh which could be extended to 40 GWh.[6]
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