Battery materials firm NOVONIX has delivered its first commercial-grade sample of synthetic graphite for industrial applications to one of North America’s largest value-added carbon processors.
NOVONIX provided an industrial-grade mass production sample of specified products for final qualification for use in various industrial applications. Industrial-grade product qualification is fast and flexible and enables a faster path to market than battery-grade synthetic graphite, according to the company. Any target supply volumes will be further defined once final product qualification has been completed and a definitive supply agreement has been established.
NOVONIX’s Riverside facility is scheduled to start mass production next year for its lead customer, Panasonic. To meet increasing customer demand, the company previously announced plans for its second synthetic graphite manufacturing plant, also in Chattanooga, Tennessee, known as the Enterprise South location. The two facilities will give the company a total production capacity of over 50,000 tonnes per year.
“This demonstrates that industrial-grade products can be produced using NOVONIX’s proprietary continuous graphitization furnace technology at a mass production scale, and is another step towards bringing our battery-grade materials to market,” said Mike O’Kronley, CEO at NOVONIX. “As we continue to scale our facility, the ability to provide volumes to markets outside the battery space diversifies our product portfolio and provides the opportunity to increase our planned production at Riverside for 2026.”
German machine tools and laser technology supplier TRUMPF has developed new laser applications for adhesive and coating preparation in battery production and for corrosion protection of aluminum components.
Coating or laminating battery cells before gluing them into modules or trays protects against short circuits and environmental influences, increasing the safety and service life of the battery cells, the company said. Before applying the coating and adhesive, manufacturers clean the cells and certain areas of the battery trays with short-pulse lasers, which hit the surface of the material without damaging the material itself.
To protect corrosion to car body components from milling, the laser homogenizes the surface by selectively remelting a few micrometers and then rapidly quenching it, making the aluminum components resistant to corrosion. In tests in which the parts processed in this way were sprayed with salt water for hours, they showed no signs of crevice corrosion, TRUMPF said.
To process large surfaces, such as aluminum components, users employ the PFO33 scanner optics with a pulsed laser from TRUMPF’s TruMicro Series 7000. The PFO33 has mirrors that move the laser pulses across the component at speeds of up to several meters per second.
This enables short cycle times, which are crucial for automotive series production. Local extraction removes smoke, particles and aerosols that are produced during laser processing and could interfere with the machining process.
“Selective surface processing with lasers is a clean and fast alternative to chemical processes in the automotive industry, for example to achieve high adhesive strength for adhesives or coatings,” said Volkan Yavuz, responsible for laser surface processing at TRUMPF. “Our lasers reliably remove oils, rust, oxides and other residues, and ensure long-term stable adhesion of the coating and adhesive, without the use of aggressive chemicals or mechanical rubbing. This technology is not a dream of the future: it is used not only for gigacasting components, but also for housings for electric motors for electric cars.”
At this year’s Battery Show in Detroit, ChargedEVs.com spoke with four of Schaeffler’s subject-matter experts to explore the company’s innovations in electrification and energy storage. The discussion began with Rashid Farahati, Vice President of the Corporate Competence Center for the Americas.
Farahati explained that while solid-state batteries promise higher energy density, safety and faster charging, they face a key challenge: they require constant mechanical pressure—around two megapascals—to maintain optimal performance. To address this, Schaeffler developed a compact pressure-controlled module capable of maintaining up to five megapascals, giving OEMs a practical solution for real-world applications.
Farahati also highlighted the design advantages of a true all-solid architecture. By removing the graphite anode and replacing it with a thin metallic layer, Schaeffler achieves up to a 40–50% reduction in cell volume, improving both range and weight efficiency. Eliminating flammable liquid electrolytes enhances safety and enables higher operating temperatures—up to 100 °C, compared with roughly 40 °C for today’s liquid systems—reducing the need for complex thermal management hardware. Together, these changes promise to translate to simpler, safer and potentially faster-charging battery packs.
Next, we spoke with Schaeffler VP Jerry Dixon, who showcased the side-by-side off-road demonstrator. The vehicle integrates a complete electric drive system—including an e-axle, charging electronics and thermal management—to illustrate the company’s systems engineering approach. The demonstration underscores Schaeffler’s emphasis on real-world validation and end-to-end system compatibility.
The third expert, Micah Steiner, Technical Project Lead, introduced Schaeffler’s magnet-free electrically excited synchronous motor (EESM). By replacing rare-earth permanent magnets with electromagnetic excitation, this motor eliminates dependence on scarce and expensive materials while maintaining comparable power and torque density. Steiner explained that this approach not only lowers material costs but also simplifies recycling and supply chain management—a growing concern in the global EV industry.
Finally, Mitchell Koupal, Product Manager, discussed Schaeffler’s broader portfolio of thermal management and sensing components designed to support advanced battery systems. These include battery immersion coolers, current and pressure sensors, thermal runaway detection devices, and control electronics that manage data from multiple sensors. Koupal also highlighted Schaeffler’s work in cell housing and stamping technologies, ensuring lightweight yet durable protection for prismatic cells. Together, these components demonstrate how the company’s manufacturing heritage supports modern electrification needs.
Through conversations with Farahati, Dixon, Steiner and Koupal, Schaeffler’s integrated vision becomes clear: it’s not just advancing one component but building a cohesive ecosystem for next-generation electric mobility. From high-pressure solid-state modules to magnet-free motors and sophisticated thermal systems, the company’s multidisciplinary approach offers a glimpse into how future EVs might balance efficiency, sustainability and safety.
EVSE manufacturer Wallbox has completed the first US residential installations of its Quasar 2 bidirectional EV charger. Six Quasar 2 units were deployed in Menifee, California, through a collaboration with Kia America and the University of California, Irvine.
Bidirectional charging enables vehicle-to-home (V2H) applications, which offer several benefits for homeowners. Energy stored in an EV’s battery can be used to power a home during a utility outage. Homeowners whose local utility offers time-of-use (TOU) pricing can lower electricity bills by charging their EV’s battery during off-peak times and discharging it during peak demand periods.
V2H is a coming attraction. Wallbox’s recent deployment is intended to gather data and learn how customers interact with the new technology. As far as we know, Wallbox has only demonstrated the feature with the Kia EV9, and when it becomes available, it will be part of the Kia Connect subscription-based suite of services.
“This is more than a technology milestone. It is a glimpse of a future where every EV is an energy asset,” said Douglas Alfaro, Chief Business Development Officer at Wallbox. “Quasar 2 puts homeowners in control of their energy, helping them achieve resilience, independence and sustainability in their daily lives.”
“As we continue to expand our lineup of electric vehicles, projects like this help us showcase how EVs can deliver value beyond mobility, playing a central role in energy management and sustainability at home,” said Sujith Somasekharan, Director, Connected Car & Mobility at Kia America.
Demand charges—extra fees that utilities charge customers for causing spikes in power demand—are the bane of the EV charging industry. Charging providers take various peak-shaving measures to avoid these charges.
Swedish tech company Waybler, noting that European electricity grids are increasingly imposing peak demand tariffs, has launched a new software product designed to avoid unnecessary demand charges. The company says its OptAI product can reduce peak power demand by 35 percent on average.
OptAI continuously analyzes both historical data and a charging site’s future conditions to dynamically adjust the fuse level to the lowest possible setting. The service is fully automated and is compatible with all EV charging stations.
“Discussions around increased demand charges have really gained momentum, as all grid operators are legally required to implement them by 2027,” says Mårten Nyberg, Head of Sales at Waybler. “We wanted to create a solution that enables housing associations, businesses and property owners to continue transitioning to e-mobility without incurring excessive costs.”
OptAI will be available to both existing and new customers in the fall of 2025.
Chinese EVSE manufacturer Shenzhen Kehua has launched a new line of DC fast chargers for the Southeast Asian (ASEAN) market. The new 60-180 kW and 240-400 kW standalone CE/CB-certified DC chargers are designed to suit a wide range of applications, including urban public charging, highway charging sites, electric truck and bus fleets, and other commercial use cases.
The new chargers are equipped with over 100 safety features, including over-voltage, over-current, over-temperature, leakage protection, and lightning strike defense. Charging module in-position detection is designed to ensure proper installation, preventing risks such as arcing or sparking. An ingress protection rating of IP55 certifies that the units are dust-proof and waterproof, making them suitable for gritty industrial settings such as mines. The operational temperature range of -30° to 55° C enables them to function in extreme climates.
The operation and maintenance management system supports over-the-air upgrades and fault log recording, and also supports local storage of charging data.
The 400 kW model features dual cables, so it can charge two vehicles simultaneously, distributing power evenly between both charging outputs. It boasts 96.5% efficiency, and 500 amps of charging current—sufficient to charge the new generation of 800-volt EVs.
Both models include a cable management system and an intuitive smart screen interface, and both support various payment methods, including QR codes, RFID, credit cards and Autocharge.
Kehua’s in-house-designed charging modules are specifically engineered to integrate seamlessly with the chargers. The company says it has rigorously tested the modules in various real-world applications. “We simulate various operational scenarios and subject the chargers to 2 hours of high-temperature aging tests to ensure they remain reliable under the most demanding environments.”
Battery electrode supplier Ateios Systems has teamed up with materials and chemicals manufacturer Kodak to demonstrate a high-speed, solvent-free production process for the manufacturing of high-energy electrodes for EV batteries.
The system, powered by Atelos’s RaiCure platform, reaches a coating speed of 80 meters per minute, which the companies say is nearly three times faster than the industry-standard 30 meters per minute for fluorine-polymer-based electrodes.
The system achieves those speeds while enabling high-voltage stability and coatings greater than 5 mAh/cm² thick, producing electrodes suitable for synthetic graphite, lithium cobalt oxide (LCO), nickel manganese cobalt (NMC), and lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery materials.
The process builds on Kodak’s legacy in high-precision coating and materials science, combined with Ateios’s fabless manufacturing model. Kodak’s pilot line supports widths up to 440 mm at speeds over 100 meters per minute. It is capable of producing more than 500 MWh of high-energy electrodes annually. Kodak’s full-scale production line handles widths of up to 1.5 meters at a speed over 100 meters per minute, exceeding the equivalent of 2 GWh of electrode capacity per year.
In the partnership, Ateios leads the development of electrode chemistries and integration processes while Kodak contributes its expertise in mass production that achieves multi-layer precision, in-line quality scanning and full IP and supply chain security. The companies state they can take new battery designs from lab concept to commercial-scale production in 2-3 months.
Ateios was awarded a $350,000 R&D and Superboost grant from the NSF Energy Storage Engine in Upstate New York.
“Backed by a resilient supply chain, RaiCure delivers high-energy, high-quality, PFA-free electrodes at record-setting speed, giving battery makers the ability to build better batteries,” said Rajan Kumar, CEO and founder of Ateios Systems. “We’ve already secured multiple purchase orders and are shipping electrodes to battery OEMs in Asia and North America.”
As predicted, US EV sales mushroomed prior to the expiration of the federal tax credits. Will sales now crater sans credits? That remains to be seen, but for now, California’s EV market share has surged to a European-style level, and the state continues to take measures to keep the EV transition going.
In the third quarter of 2025, “zero-emission vehicles” (as defined by the California Energy Commission) accounted for 29.1% of new car sales, the highest quarterly sales share ever recorded in the state.
Now, the CEC’s definition of ZEVs is a little different than the one the rest of us use—it includes both battery EVs and plug-in hybrids. If we de-hype their figures, we find that battery EVs achieved a 25% market share in the 3rd quarter (and 21% year-to-date). That’s still a record, and still impressive. We also find that EVs are soundly outselling PHEVs (277,444 vs 48,085 YTD). (Yes, fuel cell vehicles are still around, but only in trace amounts—239 have been sold YTD.)
“This is unprecedented – we’re nearing a third of all new vehicles sold in the fourth largest economy on the planet being clean cars,” said Governor Gavin Newsom. “We’re setting new records because this state believes in innovation, not isolation. While [the federal government] sells out American innovation to China, California will keep charging ahead on our path to a future of cleaner air.”
“This is a defining moment for California’s ZEV progress and sends a clear message to Washington: ZEVs are here to stay,” said California Energy Commissioner Nancy Skinner.
Other stats back up Ms. Skinner’s assertion: In Q1 of this year, there were 146 ZEV models available in the state, compared to 105 models in Q1 of last year. The CEC says there are over 200,000 publicly accessible EV charging stations statewide, and an estimated 800,000 private EV chargers at single-family homes.
California continues to work to improve the state’s EV charging network. In October, the state adopted new EV charger reliability and reporting regulations, and the CEC approved two National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program projects that will build out 64 fast chargers along key highway corridors. CEC also approved three grants totaling more than $10 million, to build out more than 1,000 Level 2 EV charging ports, the majority in low-income, disadvantaged, or affordable multifamily housing complexes.
Durapower Group, a Singapore-based lithium-ion battery provider, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Turkey’s Kıvanç Enerji to evaluate the creation of a joint venture to manufacture battery cells and packs in Turkey, aiming to supply the US market and support regional EV supply chain resilience.
The planned facility will target gigawatt-hour-scale production of Lithium Manganese Iron Phosphate (LMFP), Nickel Manganese Cobalt Oxide (NMC), and NMC-XNO chemistries. The partnership envisions a phased build-out of capacity to serve demand for commercial electric vehicles and energy storage systems. The companies says there is future potential to expand by establishing a US-based manufacturing plant, depending on market developments.
From left: Mr. Sanjay Bakshi, Senior Group Director for the Americas Market, Durapower; and Mr. Nizamettin Derbil, Deputy General Manager, Kıvanç Enerji.
Durapower’s core business covers lithium-ion cell research, development, manufacturing and system integration for EVs, with applications in on- and off-road EVs, hybrid and plug-in hybrid vehicles, electric marine vessels and stationary storage. Kıvanç Enerji operates in textiles, renewable energy, and solar panel manufacturing, targeting 1.3 GW of solar capacity with battery storage. Its activities also span electricity production, power plant development and trading.
Emil Motors has announced successful laboratory dynamometer testing of its initial full-scale magnet-free axial-flux induction motor research unit. The company says that this validation milestone demonstrates the feasibility of scalable, recyclable electric drive units without permanent magnets, targeting EV manufacturers and suppliers concerned with supply chain risks and rare-earth dependence.
Emil Motors reports that after detecting a stator stiffness issue in March, engineers corrected the problem by bonding stator segments and adding steel reinforcement with an axial bearing to maintain rotor air gap consistency. Early tests revealed a winding asymmetry that limited low-speed torque, traced to incorrectly transposed parallel strands. Engineers temporarily reconfigured these in series and switched the topology from star to delta, which improved high-speed torque and performance.
The test unit achieved peak torque near 270 newton-meters, sustained rotational speeds up to 7,000 RPM and shaft power close to 68 kW. To protect its only full-scale prototype, tests were limited to around 60 percent of the projected maximum torque and speed. A 16-minute high-power test confirmed thermal performance, with stable temperatures throughout. Some high-load points were not assessed due to voltage limits imposed by the interim winding configuration.
Simulation and real-world test results closely matched, prompting a set of immediate and future updates: correcting strand transposition, restoring the original star winding topology and tightening manufacturing tolerances to minimize inter-segment gaps. Planned enhancements for the next design iteration include a rotor with high-strength stainless steel layers for improved magnetic flux containment, a fully bonded rotor for increased durability and revised stator manufacturing methods to reduce cost and improve precision.
Emil Motors says it is ready to develop custom designs, scale production, and share raw test data with qualified partners under non-disclosure agreements for further evaluation.
