Battery Makers 2013 (Updated)

A big Thank You for Florian Mader for the precious help on this article.

Picking up on a previous post, batteries are the a critical part of an electric car, representing up to 30% of the total cost of the vehicle and if Plug-in Vehicles sales are growing at a 52% rate (2013 vs 2012), as EV's use larger and larger batteries (Stand up, Tesla!), battery sales are growing even faster, in that same period, sales grew by 104%!

Not many industries are growing at that rate right now, if were an investor, i would buy Battery Makers stock, like some of the ones below...

- AESC, a joint venture between NEC and Nissan, provide batteries for the Nissan Leaf and most of Renault's EV's, thanks to the global success of the Nissan Leaf and with the addition of Renault sales, this was the #1 battery manufacturer in 2012, grabbing 36% of the market, but despite growing 81% from one year to the other, it has lost share and the leadership;

- LG has been the provider of GM and Ford, as well as the Renault Twizy and Zoe, allowing for the South Korean company to have some 18% of the EV batteries market, with Ford and Renault Zoe growth barely compensating the decline of the Volt family and Renault Twizy. As a consequence, LG lost 8% share;

- Panasonic grew from 313 MWh in 2012 to 1.700 MWh in 2013, grabbing the sales leadership and 35% share, all thanks to the success of the Model S and the large batteries they use (60-85 kWh instead of the 20-25 kWh of the average electric car), if Tesla continues to grow and as Toyota hybrids continue to migrate to Li-Ion batteries, the projected Giga Factory looks more like a inevitability than a risk for the new leader in EV batteries;

 - Lithium Energy Japan (GS Yuasa / Mitsubishi), it provides batteries for Mitsubishi, which use small batteries (12 kWh for the Outlander PHEV, 16 kWh for the Miev family), so it's still a small player with 293 MWh sold in '13, grabbing just 6% share;

- BYD makes its own batteries and despite selling less than 3.000 plug-ins/year, its e6 MPV uses large batteries, 60KWh (Only Tesla uses that kind of power), so this is a surprising #5, that with the success of the Qin in '14, it will keep on growing; 

- Siemens has a partnership with Volvo and the success of the V60 Plug-in allowed it to jump to #6, with the swedish carmaker investing seriously in plug-ins, it looks that Siemens will be a player in this market. 

A final remark for their chemistry, Li-Ion batteries dominate the market, owning 84% in '12 and 92% the year after, so for the time being, Li-Ion is the way to go.

Pl	Battery Makers	2013 MWh	2012 MWh	Share '13	Share    '12
1	Panasonic	1.700	313	35%	14%
2	AESC	1.289	818	28%	36%
3	LG	812	593	18%	26%
4	Lithium Energy Japan	293	127	6%	6%
5 6	BYD Siemens	117 91	116 4	3% 2%	5%    0%
	Others	365	319	8%	13%
	TOTAL	4.667	2.289	100