Ford and South Korea’s LG Energy Solution have scrapped plans to build an electric vehicle battery plant in Turkey after their local partner Koc Holding withdrew from the project.
Koc Holdings said it was pulling out of the deal due to concerns over the rate of EV adoption in Europe and timing of the project in view of the current economic slowdown in the region.
The three companies signed a non binding agreement last February for a plant in Baskent, near Ankara, with initial production capacity of 25 gigawatt hours by 2026 with planned to expand to 45 GWh later in the decade – enough to power 500,000 EVs.
Output was to have been supplied to Ford’s Transit commercial van plant in Turkey which has capacity for 450,000 units a year sold locally exported mainly to Europe.
The deal replaced an earlier agreement between Ford and SK On to build a KRW4trn battery plant in Turkey which was also scrapped last January due to rising interest rates and other costs.
LGES said it had global capacity of 200 GWh per year split between South Korea, Poland, China and the US, and Koc’s decision to pull out would not affect its ability to supply Ford.