News

Bio Hard Carbon Co., Ltd. (“BHC”; Headquarters: Bizen, Okayama Prefecture; President: Nobuo Iwawaki) has completed the construction of its manufacturing factory for Biocarbotron, a plant-based hard carbon anode material for lithium-ion batteries (“LiB”), and held a completion ceremony on April 8, 2014.

1. Background for the BIOCARBOTRON factory

• Kuraray Chemical Co., Ltd (Headquarters: Osaka City; President: Yasuhiro Yamamoto) and Kureha Battery Materials Japan Co., Ltd. (“KBMJ”; Headquarters: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President: Hideo Nakatani) established BHC as a joint venture on August 22, 2012, for the production of plant-based hard carbon.
• The Kureha Group owns production technology for petroleum pitch-based hard carbon anode material for LIB for automotive use. Hard carbon demonstrates superior performance in durability and charge-discharge properties, compared with a conventional graphite anode used in consumer-grade LiBs.
• BIOCARBOTRON was jointly developed by Kureha and Kuraray, which has expertise in refining plant-based raw materials.
• While the expansion of the LiB market has been largely due to consumer-use applications such as mobile phones and laptop computers, in recent years there is a rapid growth in LiB demand for automotive applications, particularly for hybrid and electric vehicles.
• In addition to the petroleum pitch-based hard carbon anode material, CARBOTRON P, currently manufactured for automotive sector, KBMJ aims to expand its product lineup and accelerate user recognition of BIOCARBOTRON, through its 1000 ton semi-commercial production.
• The companies plan to further expand production capacity to meet expansion in the market of hard carbon anodes for automobiles.

2. Outline of the Completion Ceremony

3. Overview of the new BHC factory for plant-based hard carbon

Reference Information

Background for the New Factory

December 2011

Kuraray Co., Ltd. (Kuraray) and Kureha Corporation (Kureha) agree on a basic framework to jointly commercialize newly developed LiB anode material.
The outline of agreement was for Kuraray to take a partial stake in KBMJ and supply personnel, while KBMJ and Kuraray Chemical establish a new joint production company and set up a production and supply network with an annual capacity level of 1,000 tons by the end of 2013.

July 2012

A formal agreement for capital participation in KBMJ is reached; Kuraray and the Innovation Network Corporation of Japan (“INCJ”) will newly acquire equity stakes alongside previous participants Kureha and Itochu Corporation (“Itochu”).

August 2012

Kuraray Chemical and KBMJ establish BHC as a joint venture production company.
Based on the agreement reached in July, capital participation was completed by Kuraray, Kureha, Itochu and INCJ.

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