Samsung establishes energy-storage JV with Sungrow Power Supply

Samsung SDI Co. (Gyeonggi-do, South Korea; www.samsungsdi.com) and Sungrow Power Supply Co. (Hefei, China; www.sungrowpower.com) will establish a joint venture (JV) to jointly develop the energy storage system (ESS) market of China, and to make joint investment in building a production plant.

This JV will be in charge of developing, producing and selling ESS in China. The location of the planned production plant is not finalized as of this announcement. Its construction will start in the first half of 2015, with completion in late 2015, with mass-production launched shortly afterwards.

Samsung SDI is planning to gain advantages in the Chinese market by locally producing ESS battery packs and systems, and increase the synergy with automotive battery business by using the high-performance cells produced by Samsung SDI’s automotive battery plant in Xi’an.

Sungrow is a manufacturer of power supply equipment and renewable energy parts. This company has ranked first in the Chinese PV inverter market with over 30% market share and ranked second in the world.

Samsung SDI chose Sungrow as its partner for penetrating into the Chinese ESS market due to its quality technology in the fields of power networks and PV inverters, which are key components of an ESS system.