Pill Energy, a secondary battery equipment manufacturer led by CEO Kim Kwangil, announced on February 26 that it will make a strategic equity investment in Factorial Inc., a U.S.-based all-solid-state battery company. Through collaboration with Factorial, which has established itself as a top-tier player in the all-solid-state battery industry, Pill Energy plans to enhance its next-generation battery process technologies. The company also expects to participate in the all-solid-state battery supply chain.
Ultimately, this is expected to translate directly into the effects of expanding Pill Energy's product lineup and diversifying its customer base, which the company has put forward as key strategies. With this investment, Pill Energy will secure the supply rights for Factorial's all-solid-state battery assembly equipment.
Through this strategic investment, Pill Energy will begin in earnest to prepare for the full-scale growth of the all-solid-state battery market. Factorial is expected to expand its current pilot-level manufacturing processes to mass production by leveraging Pill Energy's advanced process technologies.
Factorial is a U.S. all-solid-state battery specialist founded in 2013. It is known to have received investments from global automakers such as Mercedes-Benz, Stellantis, and Hyundai Motor Company, as well as materials companies including Lotte Energy Materials and POSCO Future M.
Factorial's core competitive edge lies in its all-solid-state battery platform "Solstice™," which is regarded as having unrivaled energy density and safety. It has improved energy density by up to 80% compared with conventional lithium-ion batteries and can operate stably even at high temperatures of up to 90°C. Analysts say it has significantly raised the thermal ceiling of existing battery systems.
The all-solid-state battery market in which Pill Energy is participating is expected to see expanded applications not only in next-generation mobility (such as electric vehicles and urban air mobility (UAM)) but also in the physical AI industries (such as humanoids and robots). According to global market research firm Morgan Stanley, the global humanoid market is projected to reach 5 trillion dollars (about 7,000 trillion won) by 2050. Another market research firm, Statista, forecasts that the physical AI market will grow at an average annual rate of 23.3%, from 5 billion dollars (about 7 trillion won) in 2020 to 64.3 billion dollars (about 94 trillion won) in 2030.
Pill Energy has recently shown a clear trend of diversifying its overseas customer base. Earlier this year, it achieved meaningful progress in expanding its supply regions by winning an order for laser notching and slitting equipment from a global battery company in India. Previously, it also supplied 46-phi cylindrical battery winders to a European company, a result of its swift technological response in the cylindrical battery segment that is attracting global attention led by Tesla. Most recently, the company completed development of notching technology for the cathode active material section, long considered a difficult challenge in the laser notching process, and began supplying the related equipment.
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