Twitter headlines« Shell Announces Additional Hydrogen Stations in US and Wind and Solar Power MoUs | Main | Mitsubishi to Introduce Another In-Wheel Electric Concept »
A123Systems Receives $30 Million; Plans to Up Production and Accelerate Development for Hybrids
6 February 2006
|
| Source: A123Systems. Click to enlarge. |
A123Systems, developer of a new generation of Lithium-ion batteries (earlier post), announced it has completed its third round of private equity funding totaling $30 million. The current round of financing brings total investment in the company to $62 Million since its founding.
The batteries, based on proprietary nanoscale electrode technology built on research at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), promise up to 10x longer life, 5x power gains and dramatically faster charge time (more than 90% capacity in five minutes) over conventional high-power battery technology.
| Battery Technology Comparison | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Power density (<3 Ah cells) |
Life at 100% DoD | ||
| Source: A123Systems | |||
| A123 M1 | >3,000 W/kg | 1,000 | |
| High-power Li-ion | 1,350 W/kg | 500 | |
| NiMH | 750 W/kg | <1,000 | |
| NiCd | 600 W/kg | <1,000 | |
New investors in the company are GE, Alliance Capital Management and FA Technology Ventures. Also participating in this round are existing investors, including Motorola, Qualcomm, North Bridge Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (from which A123 licenses the battery technology), OnPoint, YankeeTek and Desh Deshpande, the company’s Chairman of the Board.
A123Systems will use its new capital infusion to increase manufacturing capacity, to continue support for its current customer base and revenue growth, to accelerate the development of batteries for hybrid electric vehicles (HEV) and to continue development of products for other markets demanding improved power technology.
A123Systems’s advanced batteries have the potential to drastically lower the weight and cost of batteries for hybrid electric vehicles, bringing a new level of performance to automobile manufacturers. An A123Systems battery is projected to be 80% lighter than batteries used in current HEVs and will offer superior life and durability.
—David Vieau, CEO and president of A123Systems
Conventional Li-Ion technology uses active materials with particles that range in size between 5 and 20 microns. These large particles are required to minimize safety risks inherent to first-generation Li-Ion chemistries.
A123 batteries, however, use a safe and stable active material that can use particle sizes below 100nm without adverse reaction. This new storage electrode enables much faster kinetics providing higher power than is yet possible from any other Li-Ion chemistry.
A123Systems is already supplying batteries to the Black & Decker Corporation for use in a heavy-duty, 36-volt line of portable power tools. The company is also working with the U.S. Department of Energy as part of a major undertaking to develop battery materials for future use in hybrid electric vehicles. Preliminary performance results show a technology with great promise for the future of electric and hybrid electric vehicles.
February 6, 2006 in Batteries | Permalink | Comments (27) | TrackBack (2)
Comments
Posted by: Sean Straus | April 27, 2006 at 08:35 AM
The real beauty, the tantamount beauty, of PHEV is that it creates an economic incentive to drive less, for crying out loud! We drive too much! Therefore, the only real solution is to drive, and transport goods less.
A car that has an electric-only range of say 20 miles per charge, encourages the economic development of urban/suburban communities whereby more destinations become accessable without having to drive. Connect metropolitan areas of economically robust communities and commercial districts with modern mass transit, and you've got a future development paradigm that promises innumerable construction jobs/livelihoods, univeral urban restoration, and unfathomable leisure. We'll not realize the height PHEV will become, but it is surely the pinnacle of future technology. PHEV will initiate the 20-hour work week.
You bio-dieselers are so, like yesterday, totally.
Posted by: Wells | December 09, 2006 at 11:08 AM
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d8341c4fbe53ef00d8345a610069e2
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference A123Systems Receives $30 Million; Plans to Up Production and Accelerate Development for Hybrids:
» OMG, Some Good News from After Gutenberg
Power electronics companies are investing in A123Systems
... [Read More]
Tracked on Feb 6, 2006 9:51:28 AM
» Codeine. from Codeine acetametaphen.
Codeine. Side effects of codeine. Liquid codeine. [Read More]
Tracked on Aug 20, 2009 12:58:53 AM
"Assuming a 40 mile drive each day (which is long I think) that would be 2500 cycles on the battery without it loosing significant usable capacity - I really hope that is doable."
On a123's homepage at http://www.a123systems.com/html/tech/power.html they show the life cycle. It looks as though 1000 cycles at a 1C low rate discharge only takes about 3-4% off the max charge, whereas a 10C high rate takes about 22% off. So at a low rate discharge you could expect a 7%-10% loss after 2500 cycles, versus a 55% loss for high rate discharge. Seems somewhat doable.
As for hydrogen, it's all hype. It takes way more energy and causes more pollution to make hydrogen in current form than electricity from the tap (which is approximately 10x more efficient than fossil fuel powered cars). Also if you could have a plug in electric vehicle, it would actually be on the order of half as expensive to run as a gas powered vehicle. Once the range and charge time problems are solved (and this battery may be it), people would be foolish to think any more about hydrogen. All that would need to be done after plug in cars would be more efficient energy at the source.