General Motors Co. said Wednesday it’s leading a $60 million Series B financing round in Mitra Chem, a Silicon Valley-based lithium-ion battery materials product company.
GM says Mitra Chem’s AI-powered platform and R&D center will help accelerate its commercialization of affordable EV batteries. And GM’s financial support for Mitra Chem will help the company scale its current operations.
The companies are planning to jointly develop advanced iron-based cathode active materials, including lithium manganese iron phosphate, they said.
“This is a strategic investment that will further help reinforce GM’s efforts in EV batteries, accelerate our work on affordable battery chemistries like LMFP and support our efforts to build a U.S.-focused battery supply chain,” said Gil Golan, GM vice president of technology acceleration & commercialization, in a statement.
At Mitra Chem’s battery R&D facility in California, the company says it can “simulate, synthesize and test thousands of cathode designs monthly,” which could lead to a shorter time to market for new battery cell formulas.
“GM’s investment in Mitra Chem will not only help us develop affordable battery chemistries for use in GM vehicles, but also will fuel our mission to develop, deploy and commercialize U.S. made, iron-based cathode materials that can power EVs, grid-scale electrified energy storage and beyond,” said Mitra Chem CEO and Co-Founder Vivas Kumar in a statement.