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Toyota Is the World’s Leader in Solid-State Battery Patents By a Wide Margin

Having a large number of patents on a given technology does not mean you have a competitive edge on it. It may just mean you are putting a lot of effort into dominating it. This is probably how we should see the fact that Toyota is the world leader in solid-state battery patents.
Toyota LQ presented the company's solid-state battery in 2020 14 photos
Photo: Toyota
Toyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEVToyota is testing its solid-state batteries in a concept car similar to the LQ, but the production car with them will be a HEV
Nikkei Asia joined forces with Patent Result to discover which company had the most patents related to the promising technology in World Intellectual Property Organization and another group in 10 countries and territories. The study covered patents filed from the year 2000 until March 2022.

According to the study, Toyota has 1,331 patents related to solid-state cells. The Japanese carmaker has been researching these batteries since the 1990s. The patents include cell structure, materials, and the most crucial aspect of solid-state batteries: manufacturing.

The second company with the most patents related to the technology is Panasonic: 445, or 33% of the patents Toyota holds. The Japanese carmaker currently has a joint venture with Panasonic to produce solid-state batteries. The following company with the most patents is Idemitsu Kosan (272). Nikkei Asia also mentions Samsung and LG Chem in their efforts to have their own solid-state cells, but it does not say how many patents the South Korean competitors have.

The Japanese carmaker already said it will sell a vehicle with solid-state batteries in 2025. This car will be a hybrid because the battery packs are smaller and face harder charging cycles. In other words, Toyota believes hybrids offer the perfect test bed for the technology.

As we said, having a thousand patents may not mean much if you don’t have the right ones. QuantumScape is confident in its technology and promises to reach the market by 2024. It recently lost Celina Mikolajczak, its chief manufacturing officer. That means the company does not have the person that was going to put its solid-state batteries into production anymore. That’s a significant setback for a company that said manufacturing was crucial to its technology.

Nikkei Asia said that a solid-state battery is more than four times more expensive than a current lithium-ion cell, according to some estimates. SES already said something similar to justify why it thinks solid-state batteries are not economically feasible. Toyota may have solved that problem with its patents, but we’ll only know for sure in 2025.
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About the author: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo
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Motoring writer since 1998, Gustavo wants to write relevant stories about cars and their shift to a sustainable future.
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