Lithium-Ion Battery Sales Expected to Increase by More than 700% by 2017

Many hope that electric vehicles (EVs) and plug in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) will grow in popularity to overtake petrol and diesel cars, and help reduce our reliance on oil, whilst also reducing carbon emissions. Pike Research, a market research and consulting firm focussing on clean technologies, has released a new report named “Electric Vehicle Batteries”. The report describes that the market revenue for Lithium-ion batteries used in EVs and PHEVs “will grow over 700%, from $2.0 billion annually in 2011 to greater than $14.6 billion by 2017.” Whilst at the same time the cost for lithium-ion batteries is predicted to decrease by more than 30 percent.

Lithium-ion battery prices are expected to drop when they benefit from economies of scale as growth in the market calls for higher production levels. However Pike Research also call for increased government intervention and help to both reduce the cost of the batteries and expand the EV and PHEV markets.

John Gartner, the research director at Pike Research, said “The market for Li-ion batteries will be driven primarily by plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and battery electric vehicles (BEVs), which require much larger battery packs than hybrids. Battery chemistries that prioritize energy capacity over power density can satisfy both the PHEV and EV battery segments, enabling vendors to offer products to multiple vendors for multiple models. Reducing the installed price of EV batteries to $523 per kilowatt hour in 2017 will be a critical step towards making PEVs cost-competitive with petroleum-powered vehicles.”

The Lithium-ion market is currently dominated by Japanese and Korean companies, but that is changing as companies from China and North America grow due to their expanding domestic markets. The Lithium-ion market is maturing as a whole and many small companies will soon fail or be purchased by larger companies due to their inability to reach a break-even production volume. Pike Research believes that these bankruptcies and purchases in the market will cause volatility in 2012.

Pike Research listed their top 10 lithium-ion vendors based on vision, market strategy, partners, product strategy, geographic reach, market share, sales and marketing, product quality and reliability, product portfolio, and staying power:

1. LG Chem
2. Johnson Controls
3. GS Yuasa
4. AESC
5. A123 Systems
6. Panasonic Group
7. SB LiMotive
8. Hitachi Vehicle Energy
9. BYD
10. Electrovaya

By. Charles Kennedy of Oilprice.com