FREYR Battery Provides Operations and Financial Update

FREYR Battery (NYSE: FREY) (“FREYR” or the “Company”), a developer of clean, next-generation battery cell production capacity, has provided an update this morning on the Company’s operational progress at the Customer Qualification Plant (“CQP”) in Mo i Rana, Norway; and a financial update on FREYR’s cash position at year-end 2023.

FREYR casts electrodes with active electrolyte slurry

FREYR’s team at the CQP reached a key milestone by producing automatically casted electrodes with active electrolyte slurry in a dry room environment starting on January 31, 2024. The introduction of active electrolyte slurry and the safe commencement of dry room operations was one of the most significant remaining milestones before completing the Casting and Unit Cell Assembly commissioning packages and the anticipated start of automated CQP production on the 24M Technologies (“24M”) SemiSolid^TM platform. Automatic production of active cathodes and anodes is the next major milestone in documenting the viability of the SemiSolid platform at GWh scale. These first casting trials with active electrolyte slurry mark a significant achievement towards reaching that milestone.

“I am happy to report that FREYR has surpassed another key precursor to finalizing commissioning and starting fully automated production of cells at the CQP,” commented Mike Brose, FREYR’s Head of the Asset Mo team. “By demonstrating our ability to operate safely and effectively under dry room conditions in accordance with our internal timeline, our people and partners are now approaching landmark achievements on the path to scaling the next generation 24M SemiSolid technology.”

A key distinction between the 24M SemiSolid production platform and conventional lithium-ion battery manufacturing technology is the order in which electrolyte is introduced to the process. In the 24M process, electrolyte is added at the start of cell processing, which eliminates the costly and energy intensive step of solvent recovery by drying the electrodes. As such, demonstrating the ability to cast electrodes with live electrolyte is a critical milestone on the path to eventually producing B sample cells for customers.

CQP commissioning status and key next steps

Following the successful electrode casting trials with active electrolyte slurry, FREYR has completed handovers of 363 (94%) of the 388 discrete production line equipment commissioning and testing packages at the CQP.

The final technical milestones to commence automated cell production at the CQP are:

• Successfully conducting production trials on the anode casting system with solvent slurry before proceeding to casting with active anode slurry.
• Integrating the casting webs across the cathode, anode, and merge units of the Casting and Unit Cell Assembly equipment using the highly complex Multi-Carrier Systems (“MCS”).

“I am excited by the progress our people, in close collaboration with our partners, have made in recent weeks at the CQP to bring the 24M SemiSolid technology platform online at an unprecedented scale,” added Birger Steen, FREYR’s Chief Executive Officer. “The remaining work on the Casting and Unit Cell Assembly equipment is highly complex and technically demanding. Nevertheless, I am encouraged that we are nearing the achievement of FREYR’s top near-term priority: making functional battery cells for sampling to our customers using the full automation of the production line equipment at the CQP in the first half of 2024.”