Sydney, November 5th (Argus) - American automaker Stellantis has cancelled a five-year, 86,250-115,000-ton synthetic graphite deal with Australian producer Novonix due to inconsistencies in product specifications and schedules.
Novonix stated on November 4th that it plans to start producing graphite for Stellantis from January 1, 2026. The company began production at its 20,000-ton-per-year Riverside plant in Tennessee in July-September and delivered synthetic graphite samples to a North American processing facility.
Novonix said it will continue to provide samples to 15 processors. This Australian producer has also reached multi-year purchase agreements with Japanese battery manufacturer Panasonic Energy and German producer PowerCo.
The company will start delivering 10,000 tons of production materials to Panasonic starting in 2026 over a three-year period, but later than the originally planned schedule.
Novonix stated in another announcement on October 30th that it had debugged the equipment needed to fulfill the contract commitment during the period of July-September.
' 'Stellantis' termination of the contract will not affect Novonix's production schedule with Panasonic," Stephanie Reid, the corporate communications director of Novonix, confirmed to Argus on November 4th.
Novonix encountered sales setbacks when preparing to expand its graphite business. The US Department of Energy provided the company with a conditional loan of $754 million in late 2024 to support a new 31,500-ton-per-year project in Tennessee.
Novonix is not the only graphite processor facing qualification challenges. In September, Australian graphite producer Syrah Resources and US automaker Tesla postponed the deadline for delivering active negative material samples to November 15th. The deadline was related to an 8,000-ton-per-year active negative material purchase agreement.
