“Europe has lagged far behind China in the competition in the electric car supply chain.
” Emma Nerenheim, chief vice president of environmental / sustainable development at Northvolt, commented in an interview with the Financial Times in September 2022.
Then she stressed: “whoever has the processing power will be able to control the source of the material and trade.
” Before joining Northern Volt, Emma Nerenheim was a professor of environmental engineering at Meladalen University in Sweden.
Hiring him as an executive is an important part of the company’s efforts to create a completely environmentally friendly person, according to a report published on the Financial Times website on the 20th of the month.
In addition to Northern Ford, a company that has recently become well-known in China, the author interviewed Francis Weding, CEO of VulcanEnergy.
Roland Gertred, chief executive of Luxembourg-based Rivista Energy (Livista Energy).
The quotations of the two are “(our companies) have a long way to catch up, and China is already several steps ahead” and “European supply chain companies should be prepared for a surge in demand for electric vehicles.
At the same time, be prepared to compete with (Chinese) competitors that are 20 years ahead and have made a profit.
To put it bluntly, these two, together with Ms.
Nerenheim’s speech above, belong to that kind of extremely standard 100% correct nonsense.
However, its particularity lies in that except for the important supply chain enterprises in the new energy industry, all three are wearing a glittering emission halo.
The brand of Vulcan Energy is “Zero carbon Lithium”, which extracts lithium from salt lakes and marine waters even by means of no additional carbon emissions.
Rivista Energy is a downstream company of Vulcan Energy, whose business involves the refining of lithium raw materials, and its core selling point is “traceability of the whole carbon footprint”.
As for Northern Ford, which has recently become famous on the Chinese Internet, as we all know, its main business is the production of power battery cells, as well as the production of some pack, but cell is the main product.
Of course, the theme of environmental protection is also its core selling point-production energy is mainly renewable energy, the whole process is controllable and so on.
The city of Sherefteo, with a population of more than 30,000, is located on the Baltic Sea and is an important location for tourism projects in the Arctic Circle around the Baltic Sea.
The place is picturesque, but most Chinese feel uncomfortable when staying for a long time, and even to highlight its green label, the power battery maker even has a production base in the picturesque northern Norwegian city of Skellefte å, which has a population of just over 70, 000.
There is no doubt that the subjects of that interview were carefully selected.
It covers lithium ore development, lithium refining, to cell production, the whole process is green, focusing on a complete affinity with nature.
Although the interviewees speak some difficult languages in a formulaic way, their attitude of “China” seems to indicate that Europe is about to catch up with its eastern rivals in the new energy competition in accordance with its own values.
However, with the bankruptcy and reorganization of Northern Volt, more than two years later, the results must have been known.
According to EU Directive No.
87 in 2003, the carbon emissions Trading system (EUETS) was officially launched on January 1, 2005, and the era of carbon economy has officially arrived.
Different from the concept of environmental protection in the last century, the concept of carbon emissions is intended to resist large-scale global climate changes and reduce the impact of human activities on the earth’s ecosystem.
Since the concept was constructed, it has assumed the responsibility of the global future, claiming to be responsible for the future of all mankind and future generations.
, figure | regardless of whether carbon emissions are European plots to restrict developing countries, at least low carbon emissions and non-fossil fuels can ensure that human activities reduce the impact on the earth’s environment, while leaving more precious resources to future generations.
The so-called “green water and green mountains is Jinshan and Silver Mountain”, the relevant concepts and theoretical basis are still controversial.
Among them, there are accusations against the European countries that took the lead in implementing this concept, and many people insist that this is an ingenious scheme by the established developed countries to maintain their advantages in global competition and to ensure the advantages of European countries, including in the automobile industry.
Here, we will not discuss topics such as whether the climate issue itself contains political purposes, because that is bound to deviate from the theme, and only discuss the new energy transformation itself, as well as the European new energy vehicle industry chain.
Judging from the existing historical experience, promoting the fundamental transformation of the social energy model is a huge project with a high cost and a long cycle.
No matter how huge the income it can get in the end, it is bound to put up with high investment and relatively low return.
In other words, it is almost impossible for anyone to take the initiative under modern capital logic-except through a grand narrative to make the whole society recognize its transcendental value.
Compared with the performing arts of people in Europe and the United States on the issue of carbon emissions, the Chinese people have implemented the traditional style of practical work, of course, the publicity process.
Naturally, it is inseparable from the “incubation” model of online celebrities, which is in line with the characteristics of the new generation.
So you quickly saw the following picture: on December 12, 2018, the 24th United Nations Climate change Conference invited a special guest, Greta Tomberg, who was born in Sweden and was only 15 years old at the time.
During her speech, Greta criticized the inaction of global governments on environmental issues and criticized a group of delegates for “gathering here to make rules to implement the 2015 Paris Agreement” but “abandoning future generations”.
Speaking of excitement, she even left this “classic phrase” for the global Internet subcultural circle, as well as the corresponding meme-HOW DARE YouTube, to build a grand narrative and instill its transcendental value to the public.
What’s more, through a series of continuous marketing performances of online celebrities, while constantly brainwashing the audience with the original sin of modern life, and through other channels of publicity pointed out that this “atonement” method, switch to a variety of new energy products.
When the concept of “environmental protection” has once again become the forefront of the trend of the times, and the core idea of this wave revolves around how to emit carbon.
Even if the King of understanding announced the withdrawal of the United States from the Kyoto Protocol in June 2017, in the capital circle of Europe and the United States,The economic and commercial concepts around carbon trading are still the focus of capital attention.
And this has also become the core of a new round of European new energy industry.
At that time, Tesla had obviously won the top spot in the new energy vehicle, which has the most commercial closed-loop potential.
As for China’s followers, such as Weilai, Xiaopeng and ideal, they have also launched their first-generation products in the year from the end of 2017 to the end of 2018.
Unconsciously, this was seven years ago.
European companies can’t be said to have made no achievements in this respect.
For example, BMW once had an i3 model that sold fairly well, but on the whole, there are no products comparable to the above-mentioned enterprises.
In the upstream supply chain, Chinese enterprises have become very perfect with nine years of policy support by 2018.
As for the United States, although the Boston-Power with the largest capacity at that time was only deployed in China, Tesla Gigafactory was still able to guarantee a considerable proportion of the self-sufficiency rate of power battery supply and constantly updated its power battery products based on new concepts and technologies.
By contrast, in Europe, electric motor control may still be self-sufficient in the upstream supply chain system of new energy vehicles, and intelligent cabin driving may still be able to catch up with the mainframe factory and IT, but the power battery link is like a skylight.
Marketing was so successful that before joining Tesla, Peter Carlson (Peter Carlsson) held the position of Chief Manufacturing Officer (ChiefProduction Officer, CPO) at NXP Semiconductor, specializing in procurement and outsourcing projects.
According to its resume, its main achievement at NXP is to effectively organize a decentralized procurement system and build a reliable global procurement system for enterprises.
Earlier, he worked for Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications and remained CPO.
In view of his area of expertise, he continued to hold senior positions in global procurement and supply chain during his transfer to Tesla.
Even when Lei Jun first visited Tesla in 2013, he was in charge of the reception.
, photo.
Peter Carlson (right) and his deputy at Tesla, Paul Cerrutti, are both co-founders of Northern Volta.
after 2016, Petra joined his subordinate Paul Cerrutti (Paolo Cerruti) who works for Tesla, left together, and founded SGF Energy in Stockholm, Sweden.
According to the news reports available at the time, the company was founded with a high profile and was determined to “produce the most environmentally friendly batteries on the planet to compete with China and the United States.
” In May 2018, Northern Volt received an investment of up to 10 million euros.
The financier is the famous Siemens company.
In the same year, perhaps in response to the company’s location in northern Europe and the identity of new energy, the company was renamed Northern Volt.
With the roar of “HOW DARE YOU” at the end of 2018 and the changes in the political environment, European and global capital began to pay close attention to the production of power batteries outside the traditional investment region of East Asia.
The northern volt, almost the only child in Europe, immediately became the brightest capital darling in the spotlight.
Throughout 2019, Northern Volt received a total of three investments.
In addition to the 11.
931 million euros A round at the beginning of the year, there was a series of corporate and debt financing in June.
The former is worth $600 million, funded by Volkswagen, while the latter is $400 million, paid by the European Investment Bank.
The reason why Volkswagen is so partial to Northern Volt is reasonable.
It urgently hopes that local European companies can produce power batteries in large quantities, thereby reducing the cost of their supply chain, while shortening the length of the supply chain and improving safety.
Volkswagen injected billions of dollars into Northern Volt at least three times in the next two years, becoming the company’s top financier, thus owning nearly 21% of its shares.
By the end of 2023, Northern Volt had publicly raised as many as 13 financing, totaling US $8.
95 billion and about 1.
022 billion euros.
The intensity of financing is unprecedented in the field of power batteries.
As funding grows, Northern Volt seems to be planning to live up to its promises.
In 2019, construction of the northern Volt Ett battery factory in Sherefteo, northern Sweden, officially began.
In particular, Ett means the number one in Swedish.
Considering that if there is one, there will be two, which also seems to represent the “ambition” of the company.
The first phase of the planned annual production capacity is 16GWh.
With the formal start of the project, almost all the car companies in Europe came to sign the intended order with it.
According to various public news reports, by the beginning of 2020, the Northern Volt had received a total of 150GWh, equivalent to US $13 billion, and its designed capacity would take at least nine years to deliver.
As a result, the later capacity of the “cake” was drawn a circle, required by the end of 2023, to reach the annual 32GWh production capacity.
The northern Volt Ett factory was built in 2019.
The city of Sherefteo is only 200 kilometers away from the Arctic Circle, which is close at hand.
It is a hot spot for polar tourism in northern Europe along the Baltic Sea.
Because of its proximity to the Arctic Circle, the area spends more than half of the year alternating day and night in an abnormal state that is unacceptable to people living in low latitudes.
It is said that the direct reason for setting up the factory here is based on the tax incentive policy of the Swedish government.
Of course, the small town itself is also a model city for new energy that Sweden is trying to build, and it is logical to put related industries into a bunch of layouts.
In fact, up to here, the overall development of the Northern Volt can be regarded as extremely successful– it was laid out in advance, then took off through the tuyere, and was regarded as a hope by most of Europe and customers, with an investment of 10 billion yuan.
And before the factory started construction, there were orders for the next nine years.
But what about after that? This is actually a company without technology.
In other words, know how to write plans, be good at marketing, know how to please investors, but in the production and manufacture of specific products, it is a blank.
So when the project is officially launched, the real problem will come.
The tragedy of capitalism, the two founders of Northern Volt, are both senior supply chain experts.
This also means that they are also unusually familiar with project outsourcing.
It is no exaggeration to say that the North Volt, which has no technology and no knowledge of manufacturing, can build a factory and start the production line, which is taught by Chinese partners.
The results come out.
In fact, behind almost all the new energy vehicle enterprises and power battery enterprises that have been put into production in the world in recent years, there is a figure of Party B.
on the evening of January 29, 2019, a listed company headquartered in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, issued an intelligent announcement saying that it recently signed the “general terms and framework agreement” for equipment design, production, installation and commissioning of lithium battery production equipment with Northern Volt.
And the two sides have established a cooperative relationship on lithium battery production equipment business, and the two sides of the agreement plan to carry out business cooperation of about 1.
939 billion yuan (RMB) in the future.
If the time required for negotiations and contacts is taken into account, the contacts between the two sides should not be later than the end of 2018.
Obviously, the founders of Peter and Paul had a plan.
On October 29 of that year, the pilot Intelligence once again issued an announcement saying that “in order to further expand overseas markets and meet the needs of the company’s strategic development, the company intends to set up a wholly-owned subsidiary in Sweden with its own funds.
” According to these two announcements, we can see the way that Northern Volt ensures the landing of its business.
Moreover, it is not enough to get equipment and technology from China.
This important partner must also be responsible for setting up a company in Sweden to quickly solve after-sales service and possibly even manpower problems nearby.
Of course, there will be more than one partner for such a large European power battery unicorn company.
There are also a number of known domestic partners, such as Shenzhen Xingyuan material Technology Co., Ltd., which supplies diaphragm materials, as well as power battery related service providers and suppliers from South Korea.
Affected by COVID-19 ‘s global epidemic, it was no surprise that the Ett plant was not completed until 2021.
Then, towards the end of the year, there was a piece of news that excited almost all European car companies at that time-the production work was officially launched and the first battery product had been taken off the line.
, picture | screenshot of the news report at that time, which seems to indicate that a long run for several years has reached the end.
In the future, Northern Volt will be able to gradually start capacity climbing and gradually deliver orders that will take years to complete.
To put it simply, are you waiting to count the money? It is a big mistake to think so.
As a Chinese, any countrymen who read this article must not judge others by themselves.
Because later facts have proved that this is a “grass-roots team”.
The reason why the Ett factory is able to complete or even enter the production stage depends entirely on the efforts of the Chinese service side to maintain it.
The locally recruited workers have never been qualified, and many of them even show the characteristics of “nine missing fish” in all aspects.
Even workers who fail to complete the nine-year compulsory education in China will not behave so outrageously after receiving the necessary training and discipline.
Not long ago, people familiar with the matter revealed on the Internet that the Northern Volt was not only unskilled, but its internal management was also a mess.
It’s not only a mess, but it’s expanding blindly.
After nearly three years of painstaking production of the first cell, for example, shareholders in Northern Volt are planning to expand just three months later.
It set its sights on a closed paper mill in Sweden and announced that it would transform it into producing cathodic active materials and other battery accessories, as well as new battery capacity if necessary.
It can be said that the blind belief in one’s own ability has reached a considerable height.
, picture | factory promotional photo-does it feel clean and abnormal? Abnormal, that’s right.
Another insider, in his communication with netizens, further exposed a lot of speechless details, such as the ignorance and wanton trampling on the basic norms of production management by the European workers employed by the Northern Volt Ett factory– the domestic parent company of its service company supplied a number of battery conversion equipment to the Northern Volt from home.
This is a kind of core equipment in the production of power battery, which is used to activate the active material in the battery by means of charge and discharge after the completion of the production of single cell, so as to improve the performance of battery charge and discharge.
The finished cells transported by the logistics line should be placed in the equipment according to the regulations to complete the corresponding process.
One day, the staff of the Ett factory called directly to scold its supplier, claiming that the equipment malfunction caused the entire logistics line to report an error and demanded that it be dealt with immediately.
The Swedish company in charge of after-sales immediately sent a project manager to Shelefteo with a group of technicians.
However, when they arrived at the scene, they pulled out a pile of sundries, including notebooks, from the separation of the chemical equipment.
Emotion is that these foreign bodies are identified by the system before they keep reporting errors.
For such a low-level problem, the local workers in Ett even look worried about how their sundries should be collected in the future.
In fact, the Northern Volt Ett plant has never been able to produce batches of qualified products in a stable and continuous mode, like the power battery factories in China, South Korea and Tesla of the United States.
According to Zeng Yuqun, chairman of Ningde Times, in a program in the first half of this year, he asked the host, “Why can’t Europe make good batteries?” First of all, their design is wrong.
second, their craftsmanship is wrong.
finally, their production is wrong.
And even the delivered cells are defective in terms of process and quality, and problems are bound to occur within two or three years.
In fact, the two deadly explosions at the Ett plant in the second half of 2023 were equally low-level and boring.
On one occasion, workers used ordinary vacuum cleaners to clean the debris collection box after processing and cutting of the electric core shell on the production line, resulting in a dust explosion.
On the other hand, the accident occurred in the front oven used for drying and coating, and somehow the equipment was mixed with air, so it exploded again.
It is such a rabble that even if the Ett plant begins to bring in professionals from China and South Korea to supervise the army on site from 2022, it will be difficult for the factory to reach its design capacity quickly.
By the end of 2021, Northern Volt had received nearly $30 billion worth of intended orders for power batteries.
But by the end of 2023, the Ett factory had delivered only 0.
5 per cent of the total orders.
In June, because of disappointment, BMW cancelled a long-term contract with it four years ago for 2 billion euros worth of electric car batteries.
Under all kinds of pressure, PeterCarlson was also forced to continue to postpone the time point for “full production” beyond 2026.
And this is actually a death sentence for the company.
The bankruptcy reorganization of Northern Volt is undoubtedly terrible news for a large number of investors.
Goldman lost at least $900 million, while Volkswagen suffered even more, but since the amount of the financing on March 15, 2021 was not announced, it is not clear how much, except that it is far more than Goldman.
, picture | factory promotional photo-does it feel clean and abnormal? Abnormal, that’s right.
What is more serious is that at a time when the European new energy track lags behind China and the United States, the expectations of the only local company in Europe to supply power batteries have been completely dashed.
Even if localized supply can be expected in the future, we can only turn to the European production capacity of Ningde era and LG Chemistry.
By the way, we should not forget the other two companies mentioned at the beginning of this article, Vulcan Energy and Rivista Energy.
The company’s current CEO, Chris Morena, told the media that the company was in talks with several lithium companies about licensing its filtration technology to provide new sources of revenue for its renewable energy projects in Germany.
The company’s latest plan is to build a commercial facility in Randall, Rhineland-Pfarz, Germany.
In order to achieve this plan, the company will raise 1.
4 billion euros, which is now in the final stage of finalization.
The new facility is expected to go into production in 2027.
European new energy vehicles may have to be rescued by “reverse” joint ventures– through joint ventures with Chinese car companies and power battery companies, as for Rivista Energy, according to the latest news on the company’s website, it is acquiring land one after another in Port Le Havre, France, and Emden, Lower Saxony, in order to build its lithium refinery and so on.
Don’t ask when it will be built or when the refined lithium product will be available, that is, it is expected to be 2026.
Let’s move on to the northern volt.
This company is actually very typical, and its rise brings together almost all the elements of the rise of unicorn companies in the US and Europe after entering the first decade of the new century.
Full of cool and fashion elements, even the production base is built in famous tourist cities in northern Europe, shouldering the important task entrusted by the grand narrative, so that lying down to make money while allowing customers to buy atonement coupons to pay.
Perhaps as the birthplace of modern industrial civilization, Europeans today have forgotten the origin of manufacturing and mistook it for investing through roadshows, PPT and pastry, and then selling feelings or “selling atonement coupons” to solve the market.
And even if it can, there has to be something that can actually be produced.
Throughout all the links from its establishment to the announcement of the start of construction in 2019, it is almost a model of contemporary corporate financing.
But after successfully raising tens of billions of dollars and getting orders for years ahead even before the plant was built, it, like many of its rapidly rising and falling European and American counterparts over the years, was unable to effectively solve the capacity problem and produce products that fulfilled its investment PPT promise.
There has been a lot of introduction to this company in the last week, and this article hopes to provide you with a perspective.
As for the author’s point of view, in fact, this article has been given in the title.
In the end, the author just wants to sigh a special sigh-think of the old European powers in the second half of the 19th century, and then look at the image of their disciples and grandchildren today.
does every Chinese have a sense of sneer emerging from the depths of the facial muscles? Thanks to the existence of companies that really know how to manufacture, the northern volt will not be reduced to Theranos.
As for the two founders, Peter Carlson, he was able to resign with thanks from the board without being reduced to the fate of Elizabeth Holmes.
However, isn’t this kind of personal and corporate luck exactly the sadness of old Europe? However, according to the practice of Jian Zhong in the past two years, there should be the last question– how so that Chinese football can play better than Sweden? ,.
Oh, come on, I’ll reflect! , return to the first electric network home page >.
