Elentec to supply battery pack to Honda e-scooters

South Korean battery pack maker Elentec will supply its goods to world’s largest motorbike maker Honda, people familiar with the matter told TheElec on Friday.

LG Chem has won a battery supply deal with the Japanese giant for the latter’s e-scooters. LG is using Elentec's battery packs for the supply, they said.

Elentec was currently producing the lithium-ion battery packs, having installed the necessary equipment in its production line back in April. Production began in May.

Meanwhile, LG Chem was producing the 18650 batteries at its factory in Ochang, South Korea.

This will mark the first time that Elentec is producing battery packs for e-scooters. Previously, it produced them for use in notebooks, smartphones, cleaners and small-sized ESS.

Elentec is also better known as a supplier to Samsung Electronics rather than LG. It has previously supplied battery packs used in Galaxy smartphones as well as accessory cases and chargers. 

Elentec founder Se-yong Lee is an ex-Samsung employee. The company also used mostly battery cells from Samsung SDI, occasionally using those from Murata and Hitachi as well. A partnership with LG in itself was the news, the people said.

A Elentec subcontractor, founded by Elentec founder Se-yong Lee’s son Hae-sung Lee, is likely to have played a key role for the LG deal, the people said. Hae-sung created the Elentec subcontractor in 2017 which will be used by Elentec as a contract producer for packs supplied to Honda. As the subcontractor handles the pack assembly of the cells supplied by LG Chem, it will not cause friction with Samsung Electronics, they also said.

Meanwhile, last year, Elentec posted 36 billion won in operating profits and 729 billion in revenue. It is a significant rise from 2018, when it posted 1.2 billion in operating profits and 451.8 billion won in revenue.