Ola Electric to set up Battery Innovation Centre worth $500 million in Bengaluru
Ola Electric has announced that it is investing $500 million (about Rs 4,000 crore) in a cell research and development facility in Bengaluru.
In a tweet, Aggarwal stated: "Sharing something I'm personally very passionate about! Building a state-of-the-art Battery Innovation Center (BIC) in Bangalore".
BIC will be one of the world's largest, most advanced cell R&D facilities, he added.
"500+ engineers & PhDs, $500 million investment. Will be up & running next month!" Aggarwal said.
In a declaration, the company said the BIC will be one of the world's largest and most advanced cell R&D facilities with more than 165 unique and cutting-edge lab equipment to cover all aspects of cell-related research and development.
The centre will host lines that can produce all form factors cylindrical, pouch, coin, and prismatic cells, it added.
The innovation centre will have the capabilities to develop complete packages of battery pack design, fabrication, and testing under one roof.
BIC will also be equipped with an in-house production capability of mg to kg scale of anode and cathode material, an integrated facility for together nano-scale analysis and molecular dynamics simulation, and an in-house crystal structure analysis to develop new battery materials.
The company said the R&D centre will recruit top global talent, including 500 PhDs and engineers, who will be supported by an additional 1,000 researchers in India and multiple other global centres.
"Electric mobility is a high growth sector which is R&D intensive. Ola's BIC in Bangalore will be the cornerstone for core cell tech development and battery innovation out of India for the world," Aggarwal noted.
BIC will house advanced labs and high-tech equipment for battery innovation and will power India's journey towards becoming a global EV hub, he added.
Ola lately unveiled its first Li-ion cell NMC 2170. Built in-house, the company will start mass production by next year.
The company was lately also allotted 20GWh capacity under the ACC PLI scheme by the government for developing advanced cells in India and is setting up a cutting-edge cell manufacturing facility, with an initial capacity of up to 20 GWh, localizing the most critical part of the EV value chain.
