CREATING LOW COST, HIGH PERFORMANCE MATERIALS FOR LITHIUM ION BATTERIES
Company: Nano One Materials (TSX-V: NNO, OTC-Nasdaq Int’l: NNOMF, Frankfurt: LBMB)
CEO, Director and Founder: Dan Blondal
Headquarters: Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada
Number of locations: 2
Canadian tech company Nano One Materials (Nano One) hit the ground running at the start of 2019 by signing a Joint Development Agreement with Pulead Technology Industry – one of China’s largest cathode manufacturers. Pulead supplies materials to some of the biggest names in the Electric Vehicle industry like BYD and consumer electronic suppliers like ATL who makes batteries for Apple. “Our objective is to develop, evaluate and optimize scaled up production of lithium iron phosphate (LFP) cathode materials using Nano One’s technology,” explains the company’s CEO, Dan Blondal “we believe we can lower the manufacturing cost significantly while maintaining high performance materials needed for the demanding market growth.” LFP is being used in EV busses, short range EV vehicles and grid storage where cost is critical, and safety is key. LFP is reportedly the safest and lowest cost cathode material available. Logic would dictate if one is the lowest cost producer while maintaining a quality product you would be very well position to supply much of the growth these markets had to offer.
In December 2018, the company signed an agreement with French multinational, Saint Gobain who’s 2018 Revenue was $41B Euros. Saint Gobain is well known for its manufacturing expertise and produce a variety of construction and high-performance materials. The joint development agreement will focus on the high temperature firing process (kiln firing) in order to enhance Nano One’s materials. This brings two key relationships to the forefront with a recent announcement that Nano One has an additional 20+ strategic companies in the pipeline from tier 1 auto companies to tier 1 suppliers. 2019 is looking like it could be very interesting if these relationships move forward.
Rapid growth within the electric vehicle, consumer electronics and energy storage markets signals that the need for cost-effective high-performance lithium ion batteries is only going to increase. The cathode is the single largest costly item in a lithium ion battery cell making up approx. 22% of the total cost so improvements in this area will have the greatest impact on the overall price. The cathode materials market is forecasted to be a USD $23 billion industry by 2025, opening up an enormous investment opportunity for the right company in the sector.
What better way to illustrate that point than a recent headline that made a lot of heads turn. A California based battery materials company, Sila Nanotechnologies (Sila Nano), has been working on the anode side of a lithium ion battery. Last August, the company announced it had raised USD $70 million at a valuation of USD $350 million to begin commercialization. Earlier in the year it announced a partnership with BMW Group. Within eight short months, in April of this year, Sila Nano announced a USD $170 million financing led by Daimler at a valuation of USD $1 billion. The sector is hot if you know where to look.
Nano One has a patented, piloted and proven technology that is changing the way battery materials are being made. They can use lower grade raw materials, fewer steps and an environmentally benign process with no waste streams which is important in todays world if you want global adoption of a new technology. Nano One’s technical actives are led by CTO Dr. Stephen Campbell who was the principle scientist at Ballard Power and later the partnership between Ballard, Daimler and Ford call AFCC for 25 plus years.
Three reasons why investors need to purchase Nano One stock now:
- They have 2 important partnerships in place and 20+ in the pipeline that could turn into bigger opportunities.
- They are on the verge of commercializing which will bring in revenues and rapid growth.
- Credible management team that is highly experienced to move the business forward.