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QuantumScape
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== Strong partnerships with OEMs == '''Long-standing relationship with Volkswagen''' QuantumScape maintains a longstanding relationship with VW that began back in 2012 focusing on testing and evaluation of QS’ prototype battery cell technology in close collaboration with VW’s global R&D team. Over time, QS began working more closely with VW’s Battery Center of Excellence, and the company has committed >$300m to the battery maker through multiple funding rounds in exchange for a 20% stake in the company and adding two senior executives to the company’s board (including two successive heads of group research for the VW Group). In 2018, VW announced that it had successfully tested certain single-layer battery cells from QS at automotive rates of power and has subsequently done the same with QS’ initial multi-layer cells. Together, the companies have formed the QSV joint venture, through which the JV will supply OEMs with QuantumScape’s solid-state batteries beginning in 2024. Volkswagen is slated to become the first customer to receive delivery of the batteries once commercially available as well. The partnership covers much of the volumes QS intends to produce from its QS-1/QS-1 Expansion phases, but at 21GWh annually, this would represent under 2.5% of VW’s annual production. As the automaker looks to scale its EV product suite, QS will work to ramp production to fulfill as much of this projected demand as possible in the years to come. Deutsche Bank notes that the agreement with VW is non-exclusive (although VW has first priority on volumes), allowing QS to pursue other commercial partners as it scales. '''QSV joint venture''' In 2018, QuantumScape and Volkswagen committed $3m to establish the 50-50 split joint venture “QSV.” The venture focuses on production of QS’ solid-state batteries leading to commercial launch and the construction of the QS-1 and QS-1 Expansion facilities. Over time as certain developmental milestones are reached, both parties have agreed to co-invest further capital to support the facility build-out and ramp volumes. In 2020, the JV agreement was amended to include an additional $200m investment; the first $100m came from VW in December of 2020, with the second $100m coming in April of 2021, allowing VW to elect two members to QuantumScape’s board of directors. Under the agreement, the JV will ramp production toward commercial deployment in two phases; the first phase includes the construction of QS-1 to an annual capacity of 1GWh once QS reaches certain preliminary delivery and validation milestones for its battery technology. Phase two will include the QS-1 Expansion plan, which will expand the production capacity to an annual output of roughly 21GWh. Once the batteries are commercially available, VW will become the first customer with priority on initial volumes, having committed to purchase a certain portion of QS-1’s output at a price comparable to li-ion batteries plus a premium tied to the outperformance of the battery versus similar li-ion products. Operationally, QS will build the ceramic separators independently then sell those to QSV at cost+ (~$10-12 per unit), which will assemble the batteries for sale to OEM customers. All revenue and profits are then shared equally with VW. As such, QS owns 100% of the separator production facility, but 50% of the cell factory. '''Other OEM partnerships''' QuantumScape has also secured partnerships with three other unnamed automakers, including two additional top-10 global OEMs (in terms of 2020 sales) and a well-established luxury automaker. Management has indicated that the work it has done with the first undisclosed global OEM closely reflects the work done to date with VW, although no joint venture agreement has been reached yet. The two parties are jointly testing QS cells and validating the technology while simultaneously working on establishing a joint venture to ramp production through the legal and business development teams. The company has indicated that once secured, this partnership could represent about 2.5x the volumes tied to its VW partnership (or ~50GWh of capacity). QuantumScape’s work with the other global automaker and the luxury OEM similarly includes testing and validation until production can scale further, but the volumes tied to these partnerships will roll off the QS-0 pre-pilot line. Operationally, these too follow a similar path as the relationship with VW in terms of testing and validation, but the company expects that these could carve a path toward future series production awards instead of shared JV volumes. '''Other use cases''' While electric vehicle is an obvious application for next-gen batteries, QuantumScape has recently announced a multi-year agreement with Fluence to introduce solid-state lithium-metal battery technology to energy storage applications. Fluence is a JV between Siemens and energy giant AES, and builds large battery storage systems on the grid to improve reliability and help match energy output from sustainable sources to the cycles of demand. Stationary energy storage installations are expected to grow by more than 2000% from 2020 to 2030, representing $300B+ global market opportunity. Deutsche Bank believes QS’ solid-state lithium-metal technology has the potential to offer high energy battery cells that can store than energy in less space than today’s lithium-ion batteries. Deutsche Bank thinks the narrative that battery mass and pack size are less important in non-automotive applications like stationary grid storage is likely changing; Fluence, for instance, cited that higher energy density will improve its grid-balancing systems. Another tangential application for QS batteries could be in the eVTOL space. Although electric aero-mobility is perhaps some time away from commercialization, but Deutsche Bank believes that with the development of lighter batteries with higher density could potentially make the next-gen battery suppliers the go-to for eVTOL companies if/when technology matures and mass manufacturing happens in the future.
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