Sodium-Ion Batteries Patent Activities
A combination of low mining activity growth, scarcity of lithium-ion minerals, and increasing demand for lithium-ion batteries have increased interest in other candidate chemistries. Batteries made from sodium ions, which are about three times heavier and deliver lower voltage than lithium ions, have been forgotten for about three decades. Nevertheless, in the last ten years, Na-ion chemistry has developed faster and emerged as a viable competitor to lithium-ion batteries to occupy some of this battery market.
The positive pole in sodium-ion batteries is composed of polyanionic or mixed metal oxides based on sodium, which is an abundant element compared to lithium. Because sodium ions are much bigger than lithium ions, graphite can not store them in its structure. Hence, the carbon becomes so hard that it has no any crystal structure. In early 2022, CATL announced that it plans to mass-produce sodium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, and its technology was described in detail by BattScout.
As a result of increased patent filing activities regarding sodium-ion batteries since 2013, the number of patents registered each year has increased five-fold by 2021. There are three times as many patents owned by research institutes as by industrial companies, illustrating the early stages of sodium technology development and its incapacity to meet lithium-ion battery shortages. Among all institutes, Chinese institutes hold 85% of IP rights, including Shaanxi University of Science and Technology, University of Central South, and companies such as CATL and Brunp recycling. The following countries are Japan, the United States, South Korea, and France. For example, top Japanese IP holders include Sumitomo, Toyota Motor, Nippon Electric, Hitachi, and Panasonic are top Japanese IP holders. Nanotek Instruments and Argonne National Laboratories are the two leading U.S. laboratories developing Na-ion batteries. SK Innovation, Samsung, and KIST institute are top IP holders in South Korea. In Europe, French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and Faradion from Oxford-UK, acquired by Reliance New Energy Solar (RNES) in 2022 for 100 million Euros, are the most active technology owners.
