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Italian EV Battery Maker’s CEO Plans Major Gigafactory in Imperial Valley
David Shultz
David Shultz reports on clean technology and electric vehicles, among other industries, for dot.LA. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside, Nautilus and many other publications.
The founder and CEO of Italian battery manufacturer Italvolt announced plans today for a new $4 billion gigafactory in Southern California’s Imperial Valley that should produce enough batteries to supply 650,000 electric vehicles annually.
Italvolt CEO Lars Carlstrom said he’s formed a new company, Statevolt, that will build the 54-gigawatt-hours (GWh) facility with the help of Controlled Thermal Resources (CTR), a California-based lithium extraction company that will supply the factory’s lithium and geothermal power. Statevolt is still “undertaking due diligence” on the exact location of the facility, which should be “one of the largest” battery factories in North America upon completion, it said.
“The development of lithium-ion batteries is crucial for the U.S. to meet its goals to transition to net zero [carbon emissions],” Carlstrom said in a statement. “Today, we face a significant shortage in the amount of lithium that is required to meet the demand for electric vehicles.”
Carlstrom added that Statevolt’s partnership with CTR is “pioneering a new, hyper-local business model,” which said “will offer Statevolt a significant advantage in producing lithium-ion batteries at scale.” CTR will supply the gigafactory’s lithium from its nearby Hell’s Kitchen Lithium and Power development, which is slated for completion in 2023.
That would give the battery maker an advantage at a time when lithium prices have climbed due to a global supply chain squeeze exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as well as growing demand for electric vehicles—and, in turn, lithium-ion batteries to power EVs.
Instead of traditional open-pit mining or evaporation ponds, CTR extracts lithium from geothermal brine—extremely hot, salty water located in abundance underneath the Imperial Valley’s Salton Sea. The brine is pumped to the surface and then purified to extract lithium-containing salts. CTR says the process, when done correctly, could have “near-zero” carbon emissions.
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David Shultz
David Shultz reports on clean technology and electric vehicles, among other industries, for dot.LA. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside, Nautilus and many other publications.
Bored Ape Yacht Club Co-Founder And Whatnot Co-Founders Buy New Homes In LA
01:47 PM | September 19, 2022
Photo by Venti Views on Unsplash
Tech founders are dropping big sums on Los Angeles homes.
Bored Ape Yacht Club co-founder Zeshan Ali purchased a 2,000-square feet Silver Lake house for $4 million. Ali, who previously lived in St. Louis, Missouri, rose to prominence after the once-secret creatives behind the NFT company were revealed earlier this year.
Even as the crypto market fluctuates, BAYC has expanded to celebrity videos and broken into Hollywood. Yuga Labs, the company behind BAYC, boasts a $4 billion valuation.
Patreon CEO and co-founder also Jack Conte also resides in Silver Lake, as does YouTuber Jenn Im.
Other tech figures are also snapping up real estate in the city. Logan Head and Grant LaFontaine, the founders of the LA-based livestream shopping platform Whatnot, dropped $15 million on a new house in Beverly Hills. The pair sold a four-bedroom Venice house for $3.7 million in August.
In July, Whatnot brought in $260 million in Series D funding. Livestream shopping has taken off in Asia, and American markets have been trying to recreate that success. Whatnot is cornering this market, with a $3.7 billion valuation. Competitors like Popshop Live and Talkshoplive are seeing mixed results as the trend struggles to take off in the U.S.
Head and LaFontaine join Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and tech entrepreneur Milun Tesovic in Beverly Hills. Last week, Bezos’ ex-wife Mackenzie Scott donated her $55 million home in the area to charity. The luxurious zip code is also home to Launch House, a mansion for startup founders facing accusations of misconduct and harassment.
Throughout the pandemic, some experts believed a number of tech founders and companies would lead a great exodus out of California. Some did leave—most notably, Elon Musk relocated Tesla to Texas, though SpaceX remains situated in Hawthorne. But many tech founders aren’t leaving Los Angeles, and the city continues to attract venture capital firms and startups.
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Kristin Snyder
Kristin Snyder is dot.LA's 2022/23 Editorial Fellow. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
https://twitter.com/ksnyder_db
Once on the Verge of Bankruptcy, Canoo Show Signs of Righting the Ship
12:39 PM | October 18, 2022
Canoo
Canoo is a goofy name for a company. Particularly one that makes a goofy looking electric van. But the market wants what the market wants. And the market wants goofy-looking vans, apparently.
Yesterday Canoo announced they’d secured a binding contract to deliver 9,300 of its “lifestyle delivery vans” to Kingbee Rentals, a Utah-based van rental company. The fact that the new deal with Kingbee is binding, is a huge win for Canoo. Despite the large numbers for some of its former deals, many of the van-maker’s contracts were only partially binding. If Kingbee is happy with the initial delivery, the deal also includes the option to double the size of the order to 9,300.
Canoo, which got its start in the L.A. area before moving its headquarters to Arkansas, the binding deal is the latest in a string of large orders that might just help the company avoid bankruptcy. Earlier this year retail giant Walmart ordered 10,000 of the same vehicle. And last week Zeeba, another fleet-as-a-service rental company, put in an order for 5,000 units. Though the deal with Zeeba was only 50% binding (2,500 vans), it still marks a considerable shift in the company's future prospects. Before the Zeeba deal only 17% of Canoo’s total potential $1 billion in contracts had been binding, according to reporting by Electrek.
Still, the startup has posted losses in excess of $100 million in Q1 and Q2 of 2022, and its latest financial guidance cast considerable doubt on the company’s ability to remain solvent. As of August 8th, executives reported that the company only had $33.8 million in cash remaining, and its stock price reached an all time low of $1.28 on October 14th.
There’s no word yet on when delivery may take place, but the company’s stock has rebounded nearly 16% since the deal was announced. Stay tuned.
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David Shultz
David Shultz reports on clean technology and electric vehicles, among other industries, for dot.LA. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside, Nautilus and many other publications.
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