Volkswagen and rivals plug away at solid-state battery puzzle

By Eric Onstad and Paul Lienert

LONDON/DETROIT (Reuters) – Volkswagen, whose drive to develop a “solid-state” electric car battery with U.S. startup QuantumScape has been dogged by delays, is casting its net wider in pursuit of the potentially game-changing technology.

The German auto giant is holding talks with France’s Blue Solutions, which already produces solid-state batteries for Daimler electric buses, about adapting the design for cars, a source with direct knowledge of the discussions told Reuters.

VW and Blue Solutions aim to reach a joint development agreement in the coming months, according to the source who asked not to be identified as the talks are private.

Volkswagen’s move to widen its options in the field points to the array of technical hurdles holding back wider development of solid-state technology, seen by its backers as the “holy grail” of EV batteries, promising longer driving ranges and shorter charging times than traditional lithium-ion packs.

VW said its venture with QuantumScape was on track and declined to comment when asked about any discussions with Blue Solutions.

A spokesperson for Blue Solutions, a unit of French conglomerate Bollore, confirmed that it was working on a battery for passenger cars and said it had signed development deals with BMW and another company, and was in talks with a third, but declined to identify the others.

VW, Toyota, BMW and other global automakers are vying to crack the conundrum of solid-state batteries, which remain technically elusive despite decades of research and billions of dollars of investment.

“A lot of promises haven’t been delivered and several automakers and investors have been burnt,” said Rory McNulty at consultancy Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. “There’s loads of really good verified data and technology, but can they (the industry) do it reliably, at scale?”

Blue Solutions, for its part, faces stiff challenges to radically bring down the four-hour charging time required by its current…