General Motors wants to sell electric vehicles that can travel 500 to 600 miles on a full charge in the near future.
To get there, it's partnered with lithium metal battery developer SolidEnergy Systems, which is based in Singapore, but has U.S. operations in Boston.
GM President Mark Reuss announced the new partnership Thursday at a Washington Post Live virtual conference where he also alluded to more EVs coming soon to Chevrolet and a transformation to GM's retail sales model and how consumers will buy EVs in the future.
As part of its joint venture with SolidEnergy, GM will build a manufacturing prototyping line in Woburn, Mass., for a high-capacity, pre-production battery by 2023, Reuss said.
GM Ventures invested in SolidEnergy six years ago to research, develop and manufacture Li-Metal technology and AI-powered battery management software. Reuss said this new joint development agreement is the next progression of that ongoing collaboration.
The lithium metal battery GM develops with SolidEnergy will offer affordability and high performance, Reuss said. The prototype battery GM is developing with SES is intended to apply to the next generation of Ultium, which GM is targeting for mid-decade. This is separate from the battery chemistry that will launch GM's initial Ultium-based products such as the GMC Hummer EV and Cadillac Lyriq SUV.
"Affordability and range are two major barriers to mass EV adoption," said Reuss. "With this next-generation Ultium chemistry, we believe we're on the cusp of a once-in-a-generation improvement in energy density and cost. There's even more room to improve in both categories, and we intend to innovate faster than any other company in this space."
Up to 500 miles
GM's proprietary Ultium battery system will underpin the upcoming 2022 GMC Hummer electric pickup, due out this fall, as well as 29 other new EVs GM has promised to bring to market by 2025.
The Hummer can get 350 miles of range. The Chevrolet Bolt and Bolt EUV, an electric SUV-type vehicle, use batteries from supplier LG Chem. The Bolt EUV has 250 miles of range.
The Ultium system's chemistry allows the batteries to potentially go 400 miles of range, which is close to internal combustion engine range on a full tank of gas, he said.
GM's prototype lithium metal batteries were developed at the company's research and development labs in Warren, Michigan. To accelerate lithium metal battery commercialization, GM announced a joint development agreement with lithium metal battery innovator SolidEnergy Systems.
"But we're approaching conceivably 500 to 600 miles of range on the lithium metal batteries," Reuss said.
The initial prototype batteries GM has developed with SolidEnergy have already completed 150,000 simulated test miles at research and development labs at GM's Global Technical Center in Warren, Reuss said, demonstrating real-world potential.
To speed up bringing what it calls "Li-Metal battery" to market, GM is working with several innovative companies and making investments to achieve scale quickly, he said.
SolidEnergy said it shared GM's goal to make electric vehicles more accessible to everyone as quickly as possible and the Li-Metal battery will help achieve that goal.
"Because of the high energy density of lithium metal, it delivers a significantly longer driving range than today's EV batteries. Our Li-Metal batteries charge quickly, too - up to 80% of battery capacity in just 15 minutes," said Qichao Hu, SolidEnergy Systems CEO. "Our technology makes these features available at an accessible price by enabling production using traditional lithium-ion manufacturing infrastructure. It's very cost-effective and suited for large-scale production."
Changes to dealerships
Reuss said he and CEO Mary Barra have a strategic plan to transform GM into an all-electric car company over the next decade.
In part, it will involve a change in the dealership's role and how people buy cars. He did not provide further detail, but he said GM is working with its "dealer partners" on the changes and investments they will need to make to sell electric vehicles.
General Motors President Mark Reuss speaks to press after an announcement of GMÕs $2.2 billion investment in Detroit-Hamtramck assembly plant with plans to be 100 percent devoted to electric vehicles Monday, January 27, 2020.
"The dealers who are participating in our transformation they realize the growth potential for the future," Reuss said. "You've seen what we're doing with Cadillac and what we're doing with Hummer and you'll see some (new electric vehicles) for Chevrolet shortly."
GM will bring the Cadillac Lyriq SUV to market early next year and has revealed plans for more EVs in its luxury brand, including a hand-built ultra-luxury car called the Celestiq.
GMC will offer the Hummer pickup and reveal an SUV version of it next month. Customers can order the Hummer now directly from GM online, then select a dealership where they want to take delivery of it.
Beyond the Chevy Bolt EUV and Bolt EV, GM has not revealed any EVs yet for its volume brand.
Not all Chevy dealers sell the Bolt, and to sell the Lyriq and Hummer, Cadillac dealers and GMC dealers had to agree to certain investments. In the case of Cadillac, about 270 dealers took a buyout rather than make those investments to sell EVs.
"(EVs) will be a growth opportunity for dealers and it will also change how people buy vehicles and simplifyinghow people buy cars," Reuss said.
Earlier this month, Volvo said it would radically change its marketing and retail operations by moving all its vehicle sales online and going all-electric by 2030. Published reports said Volvo dealers will mainly offer test drives and do service and repairs with just about everything else around the vehicle purchase moving online.
Going all the way
Asked if he and Barra are betting GM's future on customers willingness to swap their internal combustion vehicles for electric, Reuss said, "It's a well-calculated bet."
He noted GM's history of electric vehicle development goes back decades, including putting an electric car on the moon. Also, GM produced the EV1 sedan from 1996 to 1999. It was the first mass-produced EV from a major automaker. GM has made the Chevy Bolt since 2016.