Comprehensive Cooperation
POSCO Group and Japanese automaker Honda will join hands in the electric vehicle (EV) business. Their cooperation will range from procurement of anode and cathode materials for batteries to battery recycling.
POSCO Group Chairman Choi Jung-woo and Honda President Toshihiro Mibe signed a comprehensive memorandum of understanding (MOU) on the EV business at the POSCO Center in the Gangnam district of Seoul on April 11, which POSCO Group announced on April 12. The two companies will explore new ways to cooperate in areas such as anode and cathode materials for secondary batteries, materials for all-solid-state batteries, and recycling.
Under the MOU, POSCO Group will supply anode and cathode materials materials to Honda, while promoting joint technology development in the field of all-solid-state battery materials. In the area of recycling, POSCO will map out a plan to link Honda’s electric vehicle business with POSCO Group’s global recycling business.
In addition to existing automotive steel plates, POSCO and Honda will discuss the supply of eco-friendly steel plates for carbon neutral efforts, drive motor cores for electric vehicles, and expanding applications of non-directional electrical steel plates for motors in the steel sector.
POSCO and Honda will set up working-level groups in the future to promote mid- to long-term cooperation and regular exchanges to expand the steel and secondary battery materials business overseas. The two companies will also examine ways to develop a joint response system based on POSCO’s capabilities in the secondary battery materials business and Honda’s mid- to long-term global electric vehicle business expansion strategy in response to the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the European Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA).
This agreement is expected to accelerate POSCO Group’s secondary battery materials business. POSCO Group aims to build a production and sales system by 2030. The system will produce and sell 610,000 tons of anode materials, 320,000 tons of cathode materials, 300,000 tons of lithium, and 220,000 tons of nickel, empowering POSCO Group to rack up 41 trillion won (US$31 billion) in sales in the secondary battery materials business alone.
Meanwhile, this cooperation between the two companies is also regarded as a sign that cooperation between private companies of South Korea and Japan is beginning in earnest in the context of the recent normalization of relations between the two nations by many analysts. Insiders of the Korean business world are expecting their cooperation to expand for joint responses in line with a reorganization of global supply chains such as semiconductors and batteries. Earlier, in late February, Honda broke ground for a joint venture battery plant with LG Energy Solution in Ohio of the United States with an annual production capacity of 40 GWh. Korea’s LG Chem and Japan’s Toray are collaborating on a joint venture to build a separator plant in Hungary.