Sila Nanotechnology said the first commercial application of its silicon-based anodes is for a new fitness tracker and that its longer-term goal is to help get lower-cost, longer-range electric cars on the road
Sila Nanotechnologies has begun commercializing its silicon-based anodes that boost battery efficiency.Sila Nanotechnology, a Silicon Valley-based battery materials company backed by Daimler, said the first commercial application of its silicon-based anodes is for a new fitness tracker and that its longer-term goal is to help get lower-cost, longer-range electric cars on the road.
The Alameda, California-based company said today that its materials are being used in the WHOOP 4.0 health and fitness tracker, allowing for a smaller battery and more compact device. Sila Nano is scaling up production of its anode materials, which replace traditional graphite anodes in lithium-ion batteries, and aims to be supplying them for electric vehicle battery packs by 2025, says cofounder and CEO Gene Berdichevsky.
Sila claims its silicon-based anode powder allows for a 20% improvement in efficiency over current lithium-ion cells and could eventually boost efficiency by 40%. Gains of that magnitude mean automakers can make electric vehicles more affordable by reducing the size of battery packs to achieve the same range or create EVs with longer range without adding weight.
Materials advances like those touted by Sila Nano may prove critical to helping hold down the cost of electric vehicles and advanced batteries. The power storage devices remain the single most expensive part of an EV and could remain expensive despite pack efficiency improvements because batteries rely on globally sourced commodity metals and materials.
The project with WHOOP “is the biggest milestone in the company's history,” Berdichevsky says. “We're now 10 years old. And this is the realization of a huge amount of work of actually being in market.”
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