SAIC Motor and Infineon Technologies have announced the establishment of a joint venture to manufacture power modules for the dynamically developing electric vehicle market in China. SAIC Motor holds a stake of 51% of the JV and Infineon 49%, respectively.
The partners have received all approvals by public authorities. The JV is named SIAPM (SAIC Infineon Automotive Power Modules (Shanghai)). The JV is headquartered in Shanghai; its new manufacturing facility resides in Infineon’s site expansion in Wuxi. Volume production is scheduled to start in the second half of 2018.
“Infineon has established itself as a leader in all major markets for electric vehicles by providing cutting-edge semiconductor solutions. This includes the buoyant Chinese market which has become the largest and fastest growing market for hybrid and full electric vehicles in the world.
“SAIC Motor is the largest OEM in China and thus an outstanding partner to further strengthen and expand our position. Joining forces allows us to significantly expand our manufacturing capacities in order to satisfy the ever growing demand. Together we plan to generate even more business with products tailored to the needs of the Chinese electric vehicle industry,” said Jochen Hanebeck, member of the Management Board of Infineon responsible for operations, at the Grand Opening in Wuxi. “Our joint venture will make us faster to serve the electric vehicle customers in China.”
“We welcome the close collaboration with Infineon, who has acquired a strong reputation in automotive power modules. This perfectly combines with our broad and in-depth system-level expertise in electric vehicles. Electric vehicles offer high convenience and unmatched driving experience for the customer while helping to save our planet. We are happy to jointly leverage our know-how with Infineon in the newly established joint venture,” said Mr. Zhixin Chen, SAIC Group President.
The joint venture SIAPM offers power solutions for electric vehicles in China, the world’s largest and fastest growing market for electro-mobility. It aims to supply to all customers producing in China. Infineon will continue to independently serve all other markets. The joint venture will focus on frame-based HybridPACK modules for the Chinese market. First generation automotive frame-based IGBT modules within the HybridPACK family were introduced by Infineon in 2006 and are widely used in plug-in hybrid and full electric vehicles worldwide. Their robustness allows easy integration in cost-optimized systems and fast time-to-market.
The latest forecast of the market intelligence company IHS Markit expects the Chinese production of plug-in hybrid and full electric vehicles to reach 2.0 million units in 2020 and 4.3 million in 2024 – in our view about 45% of expected global demand. In 2017, 794,000 units were produced in China, according to data from China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.
