Hyperbat, a leading manufacturer of high-performance electric vehicle battery packs, has sealed a multi-million-pound contract to supply batteries to Lotus for its new all-electric Evija.
Hyperbat was first formed to bring together Williams Advanced Engineering’s EV battery expertise with Unipart’s capability in manufacturing safety-critical products for premium OEMs.
This combination of engineering and Tier 1 manufacturing capability was established to support the scale-up of EV production in the UK and will manufacture the 90kWh lithium-ion battery packs destined for use in the first British-made all-electric hypercar, says the press release.
Full production is said to take place at the firm’s brand-new production line at Unipart Manufacturing Group’s site in Coventry.
Andy Davis, Director at Hyperbat, said: “To win a contract with Lotus to supply battery packs for the world’s most powerful production car demonstrates the exceptional technology and manufacturing expertise we have at Hyperbat. This comes from decades of experience as a first-tier automotive industry manufacturer and is an example of how Hyperbat can continue Britain’s heritage at the frontier of technological innovation in the automotive industry, coupled with Unipart’s expertise in execution. Required performance levels will be facilitated by our proprietary welding and joining technologies, which, alongside the deployment of the latest digital technologies, are critical to achieving the highest levels of performance and product quality.”
The company has said that the manufacturing process involves assembling 12,000 components split across 500 unique parts and 100,000 welds in each pack. This is a complex process for which Hyperbat employs a unique system using cameras, sensors and vision systems to monitor the data for each of the battery components.
Mark Edwards, Executive Director, Engineering, Lotus Cars, added his support: “We have been working with Unipart and Hyperbat for a number of years and are confident in their ability to deliver the quality of product and the level of Tier 1 manufacturing support Lotus needs for such a prestigious project. With this in mind, we are therefore delighted to appoint Hyperbat for battery production for Lotus’ first fully electric hypercar.”
The release said that the company is committed to selecting the best and most competitive supply solutions and is actively engaged with the Advanced Propulsion Centre to grow the UK’s EV supply chain capability through its “H1perChain” project.
Picture and source: Hyperbat
