SEOUL — Samsung SDI said it will invest $3 billion or more to build a joint-venture electric-vehicle battery plant with General Motors in the United States.
Targeted to start in 2026, the plant is expected to have an annual production capacity of 30 gigawatt hours, Samsung SDI said in a regulatory filing.
The company said the location of the planned JV plant is not yet decided.
GM, like other automakers, is looking to diversify its battery supply chain and secure capacity of components to support its electrification goals as it attempts to catch up with Tesla.
GM said last year it expects to build 400,000 EVs in North America from 2022 through mid-2024 and increase capacity to 1 million units annually in North America in 2025.
Sources say GM is considering if it will eventually need at least two additional EV plants to meet future EV demand.
A person at Samsung SDI said the South Korean company “would likely have more than one battery JV plant with GM in North America,” without giving details.
GM already has a joint venture in the U.S. with LG Energy Solution, and has been investing to ramp up cell production with the South Korean battery maker to take advantage of subsidies under the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act that aims to boost domestic manufacturing.
The U.S. Energy Department finalized a $2.5 billion loan to the GM-LG Energy JV late last year.
The companies are building a $2.6 billion plant in Michigan, set to open in 2024, one of three JV Ultium Cells LLC plants. They dropped plans for a fourth plant in New Carlisle, Indiana but GM could still pick the site for a battery plant with another partner, Reuters reported in January.
Hyundai Motor and SK On, a battery unit of SK Innovation, plan to set up a battery JV in Georgia, in an investment worth a combined about $5 billion, the two companies said on Tuesday.