GSR Ventures leads $30m round for Boston-Power

Existing investors Oak Investment Partners and Stockholm-based Foundation Asset Management also subscribed to the deal, which concludes a $155 million funding round for the US company. A tranche of $125 million - consisting of equity, Chinese government grants, low-interest loans and various financial and tax incentives - was announced in September.

The company, a provider of next-generation lithium-ion battery cells, blocks, modules and systems, is using the capital to bolster its manufacturing, R&D and business development activities in China. It plans on opening a state-of-the-art R&D and EV battery engineering facility in Beijing capable of producing 400 megawatt hours of lithium-ion battery cells annually by the end of 2012. Its plan fits in well with China's goal to expand its annual production capacity of power batteries to 10 gigawatts by 2015.

As part of the transaction, Managing Director Sonny Wu was appointed chairman of the board of directors.

"The most critical element in creating wide use of EVs is the need for a highly reliable, high-density battery solution," he told AVCJ. "Battery production is a very controlled environment, so if you can get government subsidies, it creates an edge in terms of opportunity and support. The market is huge for this - the Beijing government wants 300,000 of these cars on the road in five years, and that's about $5 billion worth of batteries."

Boston-Power is in the process of shifting its operations department from the US to China, but its Massachusetts office maintains responsibility for intellectual property development, R&D, global customer support, sales and business development.

"Innovation in energy storage is redefining whole industries and allowing us to rethink what's possible for transportation, utilities, consumer electronics and countless other sectors," said International Chairman Christina Lampe-Önnerud, who founded Boston-Power in 2005. "The growth capital and incentives position Boston-Power even more strongly to continue to deliver game-changing energy storage to customers from around the world."

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• Topics
• Greater China
• Industrials
• Expansion
• Growth capital
• China
• GSR Ventures
• Oak Investment Partners
• Technology