cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/22758824
Nov 21 (Reuters) - Northvolt, the Swedish maker of battery cells for electric vehicles, said on Thursday it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the U.S., dealing a blow to Europe’s hopes that its most developed battery player would reduce Western car makers’ reliance on Chinese rivals.
Northvolt said it has only enough cash to support operations for about a week and said it has secured $100 million in new financing for the bankruptcy process. It said operations will continue as normal during the bankruptcy.
“Northvolt’s liquidity picture has become dire,” the company said in its Chapter 11 petition, filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Houston. The company, which has operations in California, has about $30 million of cash, which can support its operations for only about a week. It has $5.8 billion in debts.
Northvolt, which employs around 6,600 staff across seven countries, said it expects to complete the restructuring by the first quarter of 2025.
Damn, I was hoping they’d pull through. Any other European battery factories in the works?
Prediction: some heavily state-subsidized tech company from guess which country - not an EU member and name starts with C - maybe even a previous partner whose unreliability hindered production - will buy the properties at a relatively cheap price and possibly make things work.
Background:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/oct/01/sweden-fears-for-future-of-batterymaker-northvolt
Diagnosis:
But some have accused the government of naivety. Jonas Algers, a PhD student at Lund University’s environmental and energy systems studies department, said: “Everyone likes the idea of a slick startup with a charismatic CEO and fancy PowerPoints revolutionising a sector.
“But at the end of the day, if you want to build a massive, largest-in-Europe plant it will require lots of workers who need to be coordinated, lots of construction that needs to be done in a safe manner, and skills and technology that need to be developed. None of this is a simple task.”
H2 Green Steel, in Boden, northern Sweden, had learned from Northvolt’s mistakes, Algers said, but there were issues in the Swedish labour market for large-scale projects like Northvolt.
Citing issues with cashflow, workplace accidents, and problems with subcontractors and machines, he said: “What policymakers need to understand is that the Swedish labour market model is in a bad state due to loopholes and excessive subcontracting which undermines Sweden’s ability to build large and advanced industrial projects.”
Volvo (Chinese owned) already bought the main battery factory. But yes it sounds like they got played badly (besides growing too quick and thinking they could just buy Chinese equipment without issues).
