South Korea’s LG Chem Ltd has entered a partnership with China’s Huayou Group‘s subsidiary Youshan, it said on Sunday, to build a joint electric vehicle (EV) battery material plant in Morocco to diversify its portfolio.
Huayou has joined the growing number of Chinese electric vehicle and battery companies seeking to expand overseas to get closer to their foreign clients and benefit from local incentives.
The Morocco plant, set to start production in 2026, aims to produce 50,000 tonnes of lithium-phosphate-iron (LFP) cathode materials annually, enough to be installed in 500,000 entry-class EVs, the South Korean chemical maker said in a statement.
LG Chem and Youshan would need to adjust their respective equity share in compliance with the U.S. Treasury Department’s guideline of a “foreign entity of concern,” a provision aimed at China, LG Chem said in the statement.
The U.S. Treasury Department has not yet provided a precise definition of “foreign entity of concern” and how it would be applied.
LG Chem also announced an additional investment plan with Huayou Cobalt to build a lithium conversion plant in Morocco, with the aim of starting mass production by 2025 with an annual capacity of 52,000 tonnes of lithium.
In addition, LG Chem said it plans to build two other facilities in Indonesia – a precursor plant with an annual production capacity of 50,000 tonnes and a plant to extract mixed hydroxide from nickel ore for precursor production.
The size of LG Chem’s investments for its four facilities with Huayou Group has not been finalised.
