South Korea's Hyundai Motor Group and LG Energy Solution Ltd on Friday said they will build a $4.3 billion electric vehicle (EV) battery plant in the United States amid a push to take advantage of tax credits…Manufacturers must adhere to new U.S. sourcing requirements for EV battery components and critical minerals so that buyers of their vehicles can qualify for up to $7,500 in tax credits under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA)…Vehicles from Hyundai Motor Co sister automaker Kia Corp are currently not eligible…Hyundai and LGES said construction of the factory in the state of Georgia will begin in the second half of 2023, with battery production starting at the end of 2025 at the earliest…It will have an annual production capacity of 30 gigawatt-hours (GWh), enough for 300,000 EVs, they said…Hyundai Motor Group, the world's third-largest automaker by vehicle sales, is building EV and battery manufacturing facilities in Bryan County in the state, where its joint factory with LGES will be based…In April, Hyundai Motor finalised a $5 billion EV battery joint venture in the United States with SK On, a battery unit of SK Innovation Co Ltd, boosting electrification efforts in its largest market.

Ford Motor Co said on Thursday it has agreed with Tesla Inc to allow its electric vehicle owners to gain access to more than 12,000 Tesla Superchargers in North America in early 2024…The tie-up between the rivals makes Ford the first major automaker to embrace Tesla's proprietary charging standard, giving the automaker access to the biggest network of high-speed Superchargers in the United States…Access to charging stations is considered one of the main hurdles so far to broader acceptance of electric vehicles, analysts have said…Tesla said last November it would open its proprietary charging design to other automakers and charging network operators…A Tesla-developed adapter will provide Ford EVs fitted with the Combined Charging System (CCS) port access to Tesla’s V3 Superchargers. Ford will equip future EVs with Tesla's own charging standard, removing the need for an adapter for direct access to Tesla Superchargers, starting in 2025…Tesla had 17,711 Superchargers, accounting for about 60% of total U.S. fast chargers, which can add hundreds of miles of driving range in an hour or less…This year, Tesla has started to expand beyond its proprietary connectors and incorporate the rival CCS standard at some of its charging stations in the United States, as the Biden administration seeks to provide billions in subsidies to expand charging networks.