Minister Hereu suggests that Stellantis and the Chinese CATL are already negotiating the battery factory

“In battery manufacturing there are already others, such as Nvision in Extremadura, CATL is talking to Stellantis …”. With these words, the Minister of Industry, Jordi Hereu , hinted in an interview in El Periódico that both companies would be negotiating for the installation of a battery gigafactory , presumably in Figueruelas , in an operation that, in any case, will be subject to for their Ministry to grant the public aid they want.

Although for a time the battery gigafactory was a taboo issue that no one wanted to mention, now no one hides that Stellantis ‘ plans include this billion-dollar investment in the Zaragoza plant , as long as the funds from Moncloa arrive . It was, in fact, the Government of Spain that revealed what was an open secret, that behind what was known as the “Antares Project” was this factory.

Then, in the first call for Perte VEC II , the Ministry, then led by Héctor Gómez, granted the battery factory 55.8 million euros, just 2.5 more than the initial endowment, of the 279 million it requested. An amount with which Stellantis was highly dissatisfied, although trusting that conversations with the Ministry will allow this aid to be expanded in the future.

These conversations seemed focused on the launch of a Perte VEC III , endowed, in principle, with 1,250 million euros, although the minister already postponed its call to the end of the year, with the aim of now approving an extraordinary Perte of 300 million, of of which only a part will be destined for the battery factory installation.