Catalonia has started the week with good news that strengthens its industrial fabric and reaffirms that it is a very attractive territory for multinationals when it comes to locating their investments in Europe thanks to its strategic position. The South Korean company Iljin Materials, a manufacturer of battery components, has announced that it will invest 600 million euros in the construction of its first European factory in Mont-roig del Camp (Baix Camp), with the creation of 500 jobs.
The announcement was made coinciding with the visit that the Minister of Business, Roger Torrent, made to Korea and after the meeting he held with the company's executives in Seoul. According to the Generalitat, which has advised this decision through the Acció agency, Iljin Materials is one of the only global companies dedicated to the manufacture of copper foils for electric vehicle batteries and electronic products.
"It is the largest greenfield industrial investment [by a company that until now had no presence here] that has been made in Catalonia in the last 20 years," Torrent highlighted. The head of Business and Work stressed that this operation "responds to the Government's priority of reindustrializing the country in a green key, with high technological value projects, which have a pulling effect on our economy, which generate quality employment and are aligned with the collective challenges of our society." He also remarked that "it is a magnificent piece of news for the future of the automotive industry in Catalonia" and thanked the managers of the Korean company "for their decision to invest in Catalonia and their confidence in the Catalan productive ecosystem to choose it when it comes to implementing their production in Europe."
The CEO of Iljin Materials, Jeon-Sik Yang, for his part, explained that one of the reasons why they decided on Catalonia was because of the climate "since the temperature in Mont-roig is ideal for the production of this material, called elecfoil." Another decisive factor has been Catalonia's strategic location because "it is well connected with Europe and North Africa, with good maritime, air and rail connections that will allow us to supply all our European customers."
The forecast is that the plant will be operational starting in 2024. It will have an area of 30,000 m² between the factory, warehouse areas, and a technical building. Iljin, founded in 1968 and headquartered in Seoul, has 1,100 employees internationally. Since its founding, it only had one production plant in Iksan (South Korea), but a few years ago it built a new factory in Malaysia. It has clients such as LG Energy Solution, Samsung SDI, Volkswagen, and Northvolt, among others.
The company is dedicated to the manufacture of the elecfoil product, a copper foil thinner than a human hair and which is a basic element for lithium batteries. According to the Generalitat, Iljin's investment "is strategic and of high added value for Catalonia, since it is a key component for the composition of the cathode of electric batteries used in electric vehicles and in energy storage applications."
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