Northvolt to slash 1,000 employees in Skellefteå

Ramp-up of battery manufacturing for Europe’s automotive business wasn’t that straightforward as pioneering firm Northvolt first thought.

“Growth of Northvolt Ett enlargement challenge will likely be suspended,” the corporate writes in a press release about the way forward for the manufacturing facility in Skellefteå.

The transfer comes amid monetary challenges as progress in manufacturing of electrical automobiles in Europe slows down.

It’s a difficult macroeconomic local weather, Northvolt explains because it forecasts about 1,600 redundancies in Sweden. A thousand of these are working on the giga-plant in Skellefteå. The plant produced its first cell in late 2021 at a time when gross sales of EVs skyrocketed. 

The corporate will now give attention to operating the 16 GWh Northvolt Ett as an alternative of increasing a further 30 GWh of annual cell manufacturing capability.

Northvolt produces batteries for a number of European carmakers together with Volvo and Volkswagen.

Skellefteå manufacturing isn’t the one northern battery manufacturing facility in hassle. In Mo i Rana, northern Norway, Freyr Battery in late August knowledgeable staff there can be a substantial discount in workforce because the not but operational plant was placed on maintain.

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