Sila Nanotechnologies is a California-based technology company founded in 2011, which participates in groups such as Daimler and BMW. A startup that bets on the promising dominant silicon batteries has now just closed its largest funding round.
The round has allowed Sila Nano to raise another 590 million dollars and raise its valuation in the market to 3.3 billion dollars. An injection of capital will enable them to build their first factory in the United States this year, begin experimental production, and lay the foundations to start mass manufacturing by 2024.
The objective is to finish fine-tuning a technology based on the replacement of the classic graphite anode used in current lithium batteries with a dominant silicon one. Thanks to this configuration, it is possible to significantly increase the cell’s capacity up to 20%, increase the pack’s efficiency by 50%, while reducing production costs by around 20%.
Another aspect to highlight of this solution is that it is unnecessary to change the current batteries’ production processes for their implementation since it is a simple replacement of one part for another. Something that will facilitate their arrival in the mass market they have indicated will occur before 2020.
The objective is to complete the development and continue with the raising of capital that Sila Nano has indicated they hope will allow them to build a plant capable of producing enough anode to power production of 100 GWh of batteries per year for one million batteries for electric cars.
According to Gene Berdichevsky, CEO of Sila Nano: “At Sila, we offer the next generation of battery materials, which allow better energy storage, require no changes to battery manufacturing, and economically increase mass production. These innovations will introduce a new performance standard for electric vehicles in the mid-2020s.”