Samsung SDI’s experience in electric vehicle (EV) battery manufacturing could soon come into play for the mobile market. The company is reportedly planning to adopt the stacking technology used for EV batteries to manufacture smartphone batteries with increased capacities.
Smartphone batteries use a so-called “flat jelly roll” design. However, switching to a stacked design similar to the one used by electric vehicle batteries could lead to a 10% or higher increase in battery capacity.
To put things into perspective, a smartphone that has a traditional flat jelly roll battery with a 5,000mAh capacity could benefit from a stacked 5,500mAh battery within the same volume and footprint.
It will take a massive investment to set up an assembly line
If the solution to increasing smartphone battery capacities is switching to an EV-style stacked battery design, why hasn’t Samsung SDI done this already? Well, it’s not as simple as turning a switch on or off.
Samsung is reportedly planning to manufacture stacked-type smartphone batteries at its Cheonan plant in Seoul. And according to industry sources (via The Elec), the company is expected to invest at least 100 billion won ($85 million) to equip its manufacturing lines for the task.
Another pilot line is reportedly being prepared at Samsung SDI’s Tianjin plant in China. As yet, there’s no timeframe as to when we might see this new stacked battery design inside our Galaxy smartphones, but hopefully, the technology will be ready in time for the Galaxy S23 series. The latter should be unveiled in the first quarter of 2023.
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