The US battery start-up Lyten announced on Thursday, central assets of Northvolt to buy from bankruptcy. The company, based in California, plans to revive Northvolt with its gigafactory and the research laboratory in Sweden as well as the expansion with works in Germany and Canada continue to follow.
On Friday, Lyten boss Dan Cook met a number of journalists in the Swedish city of Skellefea and announced that they wanted to resume production and research in Sweden as soon as possible. He will start with new hires immediately, Cook said.
The next step is to implement the extension once planned by Northvolt. “These projects are crucial for our business plan.” Insolvency administrator Mikael Kubu braked the euphoria in Skelleftea and emphasized that the purchase still had to be approved by the responsible authorities. However, he hoped that the purchase was completed by October.
Stellantis and McKinsey invest in Lyten
The start-up from California, to whose investors, among other things Stellantis, Fedex, Honeywell and McKinsey were founded in 2015. It is mainly known for its development of lithium sulfur batteries. In contrast to conventional lithium-ion batteries, the Lyten batteries do not require critical raw materials such as cobalt or nickel.
This makes Lyten attractive for investors, Stellantis spoke about the investment volume in his company report
For example from “groundbreaking technology.” The batteries are considered to be cheaper in production and have the potential for a higher energy density. They are primarily used for drones and in aviation. In the future, they will also be used for electric vehicles.
Lytens lithium sulfur strategy is said to save Northvolt locations
In the future, Lyten also plans to produce batteries for a much larger range of industries in the Northvolt plants than just for electric vehicles. This, This is how the “Financial Times” reports
, is a conscious strategy to be able to compete with Chinese electric car battery manufacturers.
Therefore, in the future, Lyten is planning to produce lithium sulfur cells for drones and data centers in the future. However, the “FT” reports that the production of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles is also to be continued.
Lyten boss Cook said that the leading provider of “clean batteries in both North America and in Europe” said. The takeover of Northvolt is a crucial factor for this. So one could “accelerate this mission by years, especially at the time when the demand for lithium-sulfur batteries grows exponentially.”
So far, Lyten has lived from investor funds
Lyten has not yet released sales and is in front of the break-even point. The economic perspective is currently primarily borne by investor money. However, the company indicates that it has a sales pipeline for batteries worth several billion US dollars
.
As early as November 2024, Lyten took over the work of Northvolt in California. At the beginning of July of this year, Lyten announced the purchase of the Polish Northvolt facility. Lyten also expressed interest in taking over the Northvolt Six factory in Québec in Canada.