Tesla secretly acquired Hibar Systems of Canada. However, apart from listing Hibar Systems as its subsidiary in the official documents of the Canadian federal lobbying agency, it did not disclose other details of the acquisition. It is reported that this manufacturing company did not appear on the list of Tesla's subsidiaries in July, but it is now on the list of Tesla's subsidiaries on October 2, which means that this acquisition has occurred in the past 4 Mid-month.
Founded in the early 1970s by German-American engineer Heinz Barall, Hibar Systems Canada is a leading company in the precise manufacture of small batteries with highly mechanized pumping systems. It is famous in the international market for precision metering pumps, liquid injection systems and battery manufacturing systems. In addition to having plants in North America, Hibar has major manufacturing plants in Europe, South Korea, Japan, Malaysia and China.
According to an interview with CEO Iain McColl in the "Business Report" in 2018, the company is well-known in the battery industry worldwide, and its revenue has increased by 600% since its establishment. In April 2019, it received US $ 2 million in funding through the Federal Canadian National Research Council Industrial Research Assistance Program for the development of efficient lithium-ion manufacturing systems, especially for large-scale electrical energy storage systems. It is unclear whether the system is in production.
Tesla`s expansion in Canadian battery manufacturing is not surprising, as the automaker has reached a battery research agreement with Jeff Dahn, Canada`s leading lithium-ion battery pioneer. In 2016, Dane transitioned the research team from a 20-year research agreement with 3M to a new association with Tesla under the newly established "NSERC / Tesla Industrial Research Canada". Through the agreement, Tesla established a new research laboratory near the Darn research team near Halifax, Nova Scotia. This collaboration recently published some interesting patents and papers in the field of new lithium-ion batteries.
Tesla is one of the global leaders in the field of electric vehicles. In recent years, with the changes in environmental protection policies worldwide, its sales of electric vehicles have maintained an upward trend, thereby driving the demand for core components-batteries. According to public information, Tesla's battery business has been mainly undertaken by Panasonic, but recently due to the addition of a new plant in China, Tesla added LG chem to its battery supplier.
In April of this year, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that he expected to implement the "Million Mile Battery" project next year.
To achieve this goal. In 2018, Tesla signed a raw material supply agreement with upstream companies in the lithium battery supply chain through commercial operations to stabilize the supply of raw materials for Tesla batteries. In September this year, battery researchers at the Dane Lab published a paper describing Musk ’s dream battery and how it was actually manufactured. At the same time, Tesla also acquired California battery technology company Maxwell Technologies Inc. this year.
Public information shows that Maxwell Technologies Inc. is a company focused on supercapacitor technology. Tesla's acquisition may be related to a technology of the company. This is a very important technology. It will affect the cost of battery production and Scale has a major impact, the application of this technology can reduce the cost and capital required to expand the scale of battery production, and can also reduce costs.
Although the outside world was only speculating about the technology at the time, and there was no tangible evidence to show the feasibility of the technology, in September 2019, Tesla updated the battery manufacturing project in its public business. Speculation that Tesla is preparing to enter the field of lithium battery manufacturing. According to related announcements, Tesla is currently actively seeking lithium battery engineering technicians to assist anode development and optimization research and development. This work includes laboratory-scale lithium-ion anode manufacturing, electrode processing, and laboratory-scale lithium-ion batteries. Manufacturing and data analysis.
Although from the perspective of talent demand, the current lithium battery technology that Tesla masters is on the eve of industrialization, and it is difficult to form a greater impact on the market, but this acquisition of Canada ’s Hibar Systems may be a special Sla realized the last piece of puzzle that Elon Musk thought at the time. In the future lithium battery empire, Tesla may become the trend of the times as always.