MILAN/TURIN -- Stellantis will build more battery-making plants on top of the six facilities it already plans in Europe and North America. The additional capacity will support growing production of EV vehicles, said Stellantis' head of global propulsion systems, Micky Bly.
"We have committed to delivering six gigafactories around the world, and more to come," Bly said while inaugurating the group's new battery technology center in Turin.
"We have already announced about 250 gigawatt hours of capacity around the world. We believe we need to go to 400 gigawatt hours of capacity around the world," Bly added.
Stellantis is also working to secure key long term supplies of materials and chemicals that are necessary to feed this capacity expansion, Bly said.
He did not specify whether the group planned to build more gigafactories on top of those already announced to expand the capacity.
At an average output of 40 gWh for the six cell plants already announced, Stellantis could need up to another four additional plants to reach to 400 gWh.
The world's third largest carmaker by sales earlier this year opened its first European gigafactory, in Douvrin, France, to be followed by ones in Kaiserslautern, Germany in 2025 and in Termoli, Italy in 2026, all through the ACC joint venture Stellantis has with Mercedes-Benz and TotalEnergies.
Three more facilities are planned in North America. Stellantis already announced locations for battery plants in Kokomo, Indiana, in cooperation with Samsung SDI, and Windsor, Canada, in cooperation with LG. A third North American plant will be built at an unspecified location in the U.S. together with Samsung.
As part of its effort to expand production of electric vehicles, Stellantis on Friday said it had invested 40 million euros ($43 million) in its Turin Battery Technology Center, in the Mirafiori complex, which will be focused on in-house testing and development of EV battery cells and battery packs for upcoming group vehicles.
More than 100 people will be employed at the Turin center, mostly retrained Stellantis workers, the group said, adding that a similar facility for North America was being built in Windsor, Canada.
The tech center in Turin calibrated its equipment with battery packs supplied by Samsung for the Fiat New 500 small electric car that is built in the Mirafiori complex. Early this week the center began testing battery packs and battery cells to be used on the new STLA Medium architecture. The 2024 Peugeot 3008 is the first vehicle to use the STLA Medium architecture and will go on sale next spring.
Luca Ciferri contributed to this report
