Kim Jong-hyun, CEO of LG Energy Solution. (Photos: LG Energy Solution)

LG Energy Solution is recognized as a company with the world’s top technology capabilities in the battery segment.

LG Energy Solution has secured 23,610 patents, the most-ever, based on expertise the company accumulated over some 30 years. Its major rivals possess fewer than 2,000 patents, but LG Energy Solution owns proprietary rights more than 10 times its rivals.

The company has poured more than 5.3 trillion won into the R&D sector for the past decade, and it boasts over 2,500 R&D employees.

LG Energy Solution became the world’s first company to mass produce NCM523 lithium-ion batteries, which have a nickel, cobalt and manganese composition ratio of 5:2:3.

The company is at the forefront of battery R&D as LG Energy Solution mass produced the industry’s first NCM 622 batteries in 2016.

Furthermore, LG Energy Solution is poised to mass-produce the next-generation NCMA (nickel, cobalt, manganese and aluminum) battery cells this year.

Its NCMA batteries will be made of 90 percent nickel while the percentage of cobalt is below 5 percent, enabling EVs to travel longer distances on a single charge.

In 2019, the company mass produced a battery with a cathode adding silicon capable of charging 80 percent of its capacity in 20 minutes for the first time in the world and supplied it to European premium EV makers.

LG Energy Solution owns lamination and stacking manufacturing technology to minimize dead space and enhance duration.

The company developed a safety reinforced separator (SRS), its proprietary technology to enhance safety and performance, in 2004.

LG Energy Solution secured some 800 patents related to the technology in Korea, the United States, China and Europe and Japan. The company has earned more than 100 billion won in revenues accruing from license contracts with material makers.

The company maintains “black box” strategies to protect patents and sales secrets related to the battery. Protecting technologies are more important since the battery industry make reverse engineering almost impossible.

Employees with LG Energy Solution’s battery plant in Michigan, the United States, look at battery products.

LG Energy Solution on a Roll in Europe

 
LG Energy Solution sales in the European market soared 332 percent in five years on the back of a steep growth of the European EV market.

The company’s massive investment strategies, anticipating the explosive growth of the European EV market, have paid off.

LG Energy Solution, now with a production capacity of 70Gwh, plans to raise its production capacity to 100Gwh by 2022.

A business report released by LG Chem on March 28 showed that LG Chem posted 6.662.6 trillion won in sales in Europe.

An LG Chem official said LG Chem does not produce petrochemical products in Europe, so sales from Europe almost belonged to those of LG Energy Solution. LG Energy Solution was spun off from LG Chem last October.