It is worth noting that this is an ad. It is a law firm that is advertising their expertise in this field. And the product that they want people to buy is revealed in this passage:
Freedom-to-operate (FTO) analysis therefore remains critical for market entrants. Whilst the primary patents have expired, a dense web of secondary patents, covering additives, coatings, and production methods, still poses infringement risks.
Of course Shoosmiths would be happy to do a FTO analysis for your potential product...for a fee.
That doesn't mean that it doesn't contain quality information. Law firms tend to make this kind of ad informative. But it does mean that there is an agenda.
It may be an ad but it has every reason to be perfectly accurate. The law firm is not selling LFP batteries.
Edit: for example, if somebody was selling their AWS course by providing detailed information on some aspect of AWS, that wouldn't be a reason to doubt the information itself. It serves as a sample.
> That doesn't mean that it doesn't contain quality information. Law firms tend to make this kind of ad informative. But it does mean that there is an agenda.
This is the best thing to do for SEO, write good and authoritative content. Which is ironic because the field of SEO started off as gaming the systems with things like hidden keywords.
If you make technology that spies really want the government will claim eminent domain and take your patent from you, with "fair" compensation, of course.
It's funny that never happens for things that actually matter.
Lithium iron phosphate batteries are very practical. Chinese BYD has developed blade batteries using this type of battery and has become the global sales leader in new energy vehicles. However, this battery faces range limitations and the issue of how to improve charging speed. Solid-state batteries should be the next big thing, but mass production may not be feasible yet. At least, it might take 3 more years for commercialization, and that's still an optimistic prediction.
> Lithium iron phosphate batteries are very practical
Unless you want to charge in negative temperatures
> However, this battery faces range limitations
Yes they are less dense but plentiful for typical passenger car (and not so much for full sized trucks or even "mid-sized" US SUVs).
> the issue of how to improve charging speed
I think CATL demonstrated 1MW charging on these already. Definitely shipping 500kW charging (tho best measure is still average km/hr).
> Solid-state batteries should be the next big thing
Sodium will (great cold weather performance and even better charge rates), but it's less (vol) dense and prices won't reach LFPs for another 10-15 years (unless you believe hype, not actual analysts).
I still find it borderline criminal that a few nations continue to be ruled by the hegemony of the automobile market. EVs have a place in the world. But there should be ten times fewer of them, because we should have cheap and plentiful public transit for most of our transportation needs. How long will we simply sit and wait for that future, complacent and docile? When will we do what's necessary to progress our society? (if we ever do)
> How long will we simply sit and wait for that future, complacent and docile?
The people who don't want to sit and wait have bought personal vehicles. Mass transit can be great, but when it isn't, there's no sense of agency. At least with a personal vehicle, if it's not working, I can try to fix it or get it to someone who is more likely to be able to fix it.
When transit isn't running, I just have to wait. If it can't get me to where I want to go in a reasonable time, sucks to be me. If my stop is removed from service, I guess I better move.
Public transport is only efficient at scale, requires up front investment, and carries lots of assumptions about population density and other aspects remaining static. Then it doesn't work for whole categories of people (families with small kids, etc) especially because it fundamentally just can't do the "last mile", pretty much ever.
Don't get me wrong, I think it's great for mass transit, but I can't wait to see the future with autonomous vehicles arrive, especially if they can cooperate in centralised networks to optimise traffic flows. I'd love to step off the train into a capsule that then whisks me home.
Speaking as a big fan and avid user of public transit, I say: not gonna happen in many places.
Public transit works in densely populated areas, like in NYC where I live. Digging and operating a tunnel costs a lot, and only pays for itself if you can run many trains with many passengers, who live close enough to their nearest station. Buses are less expensive (though still are expensive), and require a driver per 50-100 passengers, not per 2000.
As long as many people prefer to live in suburbia (which may technically be considered a part of a city, like in Houston), they are going to use cars (or technically trucks), because it's the most economical way to get around. As long as the destination of their travel is not an utterly dense area that does not require a car (like commuting from NJ to lower Manhattan), people won't leave their cars mid-way and change for a train or a bus.
It's not the car lobby. It's people wanting to live quite separately from their neighbors, in detached houses that they fully own. Or maybe cities that enforce low density for a number of reasons (mostly NIMBYs who want to keep the price of their house and land high).
BloombergNEF has over the years proven to have pretty solid forecasts. The current one about NEVs [1] has a few interesting points. Adoption of EVs is slowing down in the US due to policy changes but going to explode in countries like Vietnam because they are cheeper to buy an run. It is not BMWs and Mercs but Chinese brands.
In Europe and the US the Chinese EVs are kept outside with the help of tariffs but that is just closing the eyes to avoid facing the inevitability. Battery technology, production and raw materials is all China.
Last not least Europe is driving up KWh costs by an ideologically driven push for renewables which also doesn't help.
Renewables (especially wind) are now just about the cheapest way to generate electricity, and new battery technologies do much to help with their intermittency, so where’s the problem?
(Plus, the ‘ideology’ in question would seem to be: it’s bad to fry the planet, and also bad to run even a small risk of radioactively contaminating one’s landmass, and IMHO neither of these positions deserves to be called an ideology).
It's not just Vietnam. It's almost any country anywhere in the world that is seeing healthy growth in EVs. Especially the ones that barely have a road network or a petrol distribution network.
This is an effect that is still underappreciated in western markets but developing markets embracing renewables and EVs means they are enabling some serious economic growth. They are eliminating chunks of fossil fuel imports from their balance sheet while enabling economic activity in areas that have poor grid coverage and limited access to fuel.
Pakistan is a good example. They have a very under developed grid. Solar and battery storage are enabling the locals to work around that and they have installed a lot of that in recent years. This is enabling local businesses that previously had very poor access to reliably power to now have reliable power and grow. The Pakistan government is also putting in place incentives to stimulate EV imports.
Ethiopia is going a lot further and has actually banned ICE car imports last year. They want to reduce the amount of fossil fuel imports on their balance sheets.
Electricity costs in the UK (which I believe is still in Europe) are cheaper now than they've ever been if you have the right tariff and that's all due to renewables. Granted, that's primarily at night, but for EVs that's perfect.
One can get a tariff at <7p/kWh for 6 hours in the night. That's cheaper than gas (actual gas, not gasoline).
It is not an ideological push, but one driven by the necessity to fight climate change.
Maybe it is ideology to emphasize renewables over nuclear. But all over the world the energy transition seems to involve primarily renewables and only maybe a dash of nuclear.
For many years (20+?) Vietnam has had huge import tariffs on US/German/etc cars. It varies by origin country and engine displacement, but it's around 75% to 175%. Some trade agreements with other Asian countries result in much more reasonable tariffs for Asian brands, but some rich Vietnamese people have bought BMW or Merc with 150%+ tariff/tax. (I found it a bit mind-blowing.) So, it's pretty obvious why Asian made EVs are expected to "explode" in popularity over there. (I'm pretty sure the trend is already well underway, I know a retired guy there who replaced a Merc with a hybrid Mitsubishi (?) last year.)
But this is 2022? By now the dust must have settled. Anyone that wanted to copy and use likely planned out before they expired and got moving once it did?
Who owned these key LFP patents? It was not clearly laid out in the article which countries owned them, let alone which companies.
If they were owned by Chinese companies, then is there some faint hope that Western companies can finally start making EVs that are no longer embarrassingly inferior to their Chinese counterparts?
A foundational research team in a Canadian university in Quebec, if I recall correctly. They licenced these patents to the Chinese companies royalty free when used the Chinese domestic market. The Chinese spent the time developing LFP to where it's now a bleeding edge of batteries, while practically no-one else was interested.
In a retaliatory fight over the EVs, in October 2025, the CCP issued a ban on transfer of advanced technology for LFP batteries, and battery manufacturing equipment.
I really wish we could get Chinese EVs in the US. They’re very aesthetically appealing, have great performance and specs, and cost only $20-30k. I think there should be a modest tariff on them that doesn’t kill US manufacturers but makes it so they have to actually compete.
They have the same problem the U.S. EV's have: sketchy spyware software. Make everyone honest and open up the code / let people write their own code, and then let the true market rule.
U.S. don't want the Chinese cars collecting data, but they're content with U.S. ones doing it.
There was some kind of patent shenanigans about a decade ago around LFP.
I'm not sure if China invalidated dodgy patents or threatened to and got a good deal (or some combination) but I think LFP in China escaped a lot of patent fees as long as they were sold in China. This probably partly explains the regional nature of LFP success so further expiries might help the rest of the world catch up on LFP prices and adoption.
LFP is a nice chemistry but I think https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-titanate_battery is the future. There is still the power density issue but that's improving steadily. The thing that really sells me on this is the speed with which you can charge the cells.
> EU regulations requiring lithium-ion batteries to contain at least 6% recycled lithium by 2031, rising to 12% by 2036.
Seriously?
The EU should aim for massive growth in battery deployment in transportation and grid storage. If they hope for, say, 10x growth in deployed battery capacity within a time frame comparable to the lifespan of a battery, then even a 100% recycling rate would not produce enough lithium.
I suppose people could recycle batteries just to produce new batteries and acquire recycling credits, but this is absurd.
It will probably amount to recycling credit schemes I am sure. But that would definitely boost lithium recycling efforts.
From memory over 1million disposable vapes are thrown away each day, from 500 of the bigger cell vapes a Youtuber was able build a home battery to power his house. I don't think 100% recycled makes sense but there sure is a lot of lithium getting thrown into the bin. Incentives to recapture that are good.
this would be a tragedy if it leads to recycling batteries that could be repurposed, say 100kwh car batteries with decreased range that could have become 60kwh residential batteries.
Imagine a world without patents and tariffs. Imagine a world where companies can freely compete (no patents) and, most importantly, *have* to (no tariffs).
What? Patents have been a non-issue for LFP batteries, and the original LFP patents are almost useless today. All the new advances that made LFPs competitive are still well-protected by patents, for at least another decade.
[+] [-] btilly|3 months ago|reply
Freedom-to-operate (FTO) analysis therefore remains critical for market entrants. Whilst the primary patents have expired, a dense web of secondary patents, covering additives, coatings, and production methods, still poses infringement risks.
Of course Shoosmiths would be happy to do a FTO analysis for your potential product...for a fee.
That doesn't mean that it doesn't contain quality information. Law firms tend to make this kind of ad informative. But it does mean that there is an agenda.
[+] [-] epistasis|3 months ago|reply
Edit: for example, if somebody was selling their AWS course by providing detailed information on some aspect of AWS, that wouldn't be a reason to doubt the information itself. It serves as a sample.
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|3 months ago|reply
This is the best thing to do for SEO, write good and authoritative content. Which is ironic because the field of SEO started off as gaming the systems with things like hidden keywords.
[+] [-] themafia|3 months ago|reply
It's funny that never happens for things that actually matter.
[+] [-] rule2025|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] dzhiurgis|3 months ago|reply
Unless you want to charge in negative temperatures
> However, this battery faces range limitations
Yes they are less dense but plentiful for typical passenger car (and not so much for full sized trucks or even "mid-sized" US SUVs).
> the issue of how to improve charging speed
I think CATL demonstrated 1MW charging on these already. Definitely shipping 500kW charging (tho best measure is still average km/hr).
> Solid-state batteries should be the next big thing
Sodium will (great cold weather performance and even better charge rates), but it's less (vol) dense and prices won't reach LFPs for another 10-15 years (unless you believe hype, not actual analysts).
[+] [-] idiotsecant|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] 0xbadcafebee|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] toast0|3 months ago|reply
The people who don't want to sit and wait have bought personal vehicles. Mass transit can be great, but when it isn't, there's no sense of agency. At least with a personal vehicle, if it's not working, I can try to fix it or get it to someone who is more likely to be able to fix it.
When transit isn't running, I just have to wait. If it can't get me to where I want to go in a reasonable time, sucks to be me. If my stop is removed from service, I guess I better move.
[+] [-] zmmmmm|3 months ago|reply
Don't get me wrong, I think it's great for mass transit, but I can't wait to see the future with autonomous vehicles arrive, especially if they can cooperate in centralised networks to optimise traffic flows. I'd love to step off the train into a capsule that then whisks me home.
[+] [-] wqaatwt|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] nine_k|3 months ago|reply
Public transit works in densely populated areas, like in NYC where I live. Digging and operating a tunnel costs a lot, and only pays for itself if you can run many trains with many passengers, who live close enough to their nearest station. Buses are less expensive (though still are expensive), and require a driver per 50-100 passengers, not per 2000.
As long as many people prefer to live in suburbia (which may technically be considered a part of a city, like in Houston), they are going to use cars (or technically trucks), because it's the most economical way to get around. As long as the destination of their travel is not an utterly dense area that does not require a car (like commuting from NJ to lower Manhattan), people won't leave their cars mid-way and change for a train or a bus.
It's not the car lobby. It's people wanting to live quite separately from their neighbors, in detached houses that they fully own. Or maybe cities that enforce low density for a number of reasons (mostly NIMBYs who want to keep the price of their house and land high).
[+] [-] lmpdev|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] dust42|3 months ago|reply
In Europe and the US the Chinese EVs are kept outside with the help of tariffs but that is just closing the eyes to avoid facing the inevitability. Battery technology, production and raw materials is all China.
Last not least Europe is driving up KWh costs by an ideologically driven push for renewables which also doesn't help.
[1] https://about.bnef.com/insights/clean-transport/electric-veh...
[+] [-] gmac|3 months ago|reply
Renewables (especially wind) are now just about the cheapest way to generate electricity, and new battery technologies do much to help with their intermittency, so where’s the problem?
(Plus, the ‘ideology’ in question would seem to be: it’s bad to fry the planet, and also bad to run even a small risk of radioactively contaminating one’s landmass, and IMHO neither of these positions deserves to be called an ideology).
[+] [-] jillesvangurp|3 months ago|reply
This is an effect that is still underappreciated in western markets but developing markets embracing renewables and EVs means they are enabling some serious economic growth. They are eliminating chunks of fossil fuel imports from their balance sheet while enabling economic activity in areas that have poor grid coverage and limited access to fuel.
Pakistan is a good example. They have a very under developed grid. Solar and battery storage are enabling the locals to work around that and they have installed a lot of that in recent years. This is enabling local businesses that previously had very poor access to reliably power to now have reliable power and grow. The Pakistan government is also putting in place incentives to stimulate EV imports.
Ethiopia is going a lot further and has actually banned ICE car imports last year. They want to reduce the amount of fossil fuel imports on their balance sheets.
[+] [-] hgomersall|3 months ago|reply
One can get a tariff at <7p/kWh for 6 hours in the night. That's cheaper than gas (actual gas, not gasoline).
[+] [-] oezi|3 months ago|reply
It is not an ideological push, but one driven by the necessity to fight climate change.
Maybe it is ideology to emphasize renewables over nuclear. But all over the world the energy transition seems to involve primarily renewables and only maybe a dash of nuclear.
[+] [-] ploxiln|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] ZeroGravitas|3 months ago|reply
Coincidentally that's roughly when the UK government banned the building of onshore wind across England, which was only recently revrsed.
Now that sounds like an Ideologically driven attempt to raise electricity prices.
[+] [-] tromp|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] andy_ppp|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] kopirgan|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] thebeardisred|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] martinpw|3 months ago|reply
If they were owned by Chinese companies, then is there some faint hope that Western companies can finally start making EVs that are no longer embarrassingly inferior to their Chinese counterparts?
[+] [-] k1musab1|3 months ago|reply
In a retaliatory fight over the EVs, in October 2025, the CCP issued a ban on transfer of advanced technology for LFP batteries, and battery manufacturing equipment.
[+] [-] dabinat|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] purpleidea|3 months ago|reply
U.S. don't want the Chinese cars collecting data, but they're content with U.S. ones doing it.
[+] [-] ZeroGravitas|3 months ago|reply
I'm not sure if China invalidated dodgy patents or threatened to and got a good deal (or some combination) but I think LFP in China escaped a lot of patent fees as long as they were sold in China. This probably partly explains the regional nature of LFP success so further expiries might help the rest of the world catch up on LFP prices and adoption.
[+] [-] jacquesm|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] amluto|3 months ago|reply
Seriously?
The EU should aim for massive growth in battery deployment in transportation and grid storage. If they hope for, say, 10x growth in deployed battery capacity within a time frame comparable to the lifespan of a battery, then even a 100% recycling rate would not produce enough lithium.
I suppose people could recycle batteries just to produce new batteries and acquire recycling credits, but this is absurd.
[+] [-] ehnto|3 months ago|reply
From memory over 1million disposable vapes are thrown away each day, from 500 of the bigger cell vapes a Youtuber was able build a home battery to power his house. I don't think 100% recycled makes sense but there sure is a lot of lithium getting thrown into the bin. Incentives to recapture that are good.
[+] [-] m463|3 months ago|reply
this would be a tragedy if it leads to recycling batteries that could be repurposed, say 100kwh car batteries with decreased range that could have become 60kwh residential batteries.
[+] [-] fedeb95|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] Ryan07|3 months ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] cyberax|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] mitthrowaway2|3 months ago|reply
As far as I'm aware they've been an issue (outside of China) for the last 20 years.
[+] [-] silon42|3 months ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 months ago|reply
[deleted]