Ather joins hands with Amara Raja Advanced Cell Technologies for battery cells

NEW DELHI: Electric vehicle manufacturer Ather Energy has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Amara Raja Advanced Cell Technologies (ARACT) to develop and supply NMC (Nickel Manganese Cobalt) and LFP (Lithium Iron Phosphate) Lithium-Ion (Li-ion) and other advanced chemistry cells on Thursday.

Both companies will focus on building market-relevant solutions in India’s journey towards the indigenisation of Electric Vehicle technologies, according to a press release.

In June, Amara Raja Energy and Mobility acquired a Rs 170 crore (20 million euros) stake in Norwegian battery manufacturing company InoBat AS, the company informed the exchange in a filing.

The company informed the exchanges that it is acquiring around 4.5 per cent stake in InoBat AS and after the acquisition, the stake of the company will increase to 9.32 per cent.

The move was aimed at enhancing its capabilities in the production of batteries for electric vehicles custom-designed to meet the specific requirements of global mainstream and specialist OEMs within the automotive, commercial vehicle, motorsport, and aerospace sectors, and has shown significant growth in recent times.

Reacting to the development, Tarun Mehta, Co-founder and CEO at Ather Energy, said, “We’re taking a significant step forward by promoting homegrown cell technology. This will help us optimise costs and enable us to source lithium-ion cells tailored to Ather’s specific requirements, further enhancing our ability to innovate and scale efficiently. Our aim is to help the domestic industry grow significantly to support India’s energy demand now and in the coming future.”

Vikramaditya Gourineni, Executive Director, Amara Raja Energy & Mobility Ltd said, “At Amara Raja, we have significantly progressed in our efforts to build world-class facilities to manufacture cell and battery packs customised for Indian conditions. Our recent collaboration with Gotion-InoBat will accelerate our efforts towards the same.”

Ather Energy has designed and built its battery packs in-house and currently has two manufacturing facilities in Tamil Nadu. As per the company, one manufacturing facility is dedicated to battery production and the other to vehicle assembly.

The EV manufacturer has recently announced its plans to open a third facility in Maharashtra which will allow Ather to get closer to more markets in the country.

Amara Raja had announced an investment outlay of Rs 9,500 crores to establish a 16Gwh capacity gigafactory in Telangana. Additionally, the company is establishing state-of-the-art advanced research and innovation centre called ‘ePositive Energy Labs’ in Hyderabad to enhance its R&D capabilities,” the release read.