Indian Lithium-Ion And Materials Recycler Attero Plans Major Global Push

Attero, India’s largest & a leading global Li-Ion battery recycling company, has announced ambitious plans to expand its footprint across the Europe, US and Indonesia markets. With claims on some of the most efficient and patented processes for lithium ion battery recycling for precious metals, Attero claims to be the sole company to profitably recycle all kinds of end of life Li-Ion batteries (LFP, various NMC, LCO, LTO LMO etc) and extract critical metals including Cobalt, Nickel, Lithium, Graphite and Manganese. Read our interview with Co-Founder Nitin Gupta for a more detailed story on the firm’s technology and vision.

With its strong base in the Indian market where it has the highest market share, Attero plans to set up operations and mega recycling facilities in Poland (Europe), Ohio (USA), and Indonesia, for which it has earmarked an investment of USD 1 Billion. Through this investment, Attero aims to recycle more than 3,00,000 MT of Lithium-Ion battery waste per year by 2027 in its facilities spread across Europe, US, India and Indonesia.

Attero’s expansion plan will be rolled out in a phased-out manner. As a part of the first phase, Attero will invest USD 500 million to scale its Li-Ion battery recycling capacity to 1,50,000 MT by 2025. During this phase, it will be setting up state-of-art facilities and employing its patented recycling technology to provide sustainable and specialised recycling solutions in these international markets. The European facility will be functional by the fourth quarter of 2022, while the USA facility will be up and running by the third quarter of 2023. The Indonesian factory is slated to be functional by the first quarter of 2024. Attero hopes that this capacity expansion will enable Attero to become a global leader in fulfilling Green Metal demand and meet over 15% of the world’s demand for Cobalt, Lithium, Graphite, Nickel, amongst others. In tandem with its plans to expand overseas, Attero has plans to expand its India operations, where it has an existing facility at Roorkee.

In phase 2, to reach its target of 3,00,000 MT of Lithium-Ion battery waste per year by 2027, Attero will infuse an additional USD 500 million. This additional Capex will be used to enhance the capacity by 1,50,000 MT through its facilities spread across Europe, USA, India and Indonesia.

Attero  claims that it has been successfully recycling all kinds of end of life Li-Ion batteries (LFP, various NMC, LCO, LTO LMO etc), factory waste, and black mass and extracting pure battery grade Lithium Carbonate, Cobalt, Graphite, Nickel, Manganese among others. The extracted materials are sold in the market at LME or Fast Market prices ensuring a healthy circular supply chain.

It says that it’s the only company in the world to be approved by UNFCCC for safely reducing carbon emissions from recycling e-waste and Li-Ion waste.

Nitin Gupta CEO and Co-founder, Attero says, “By 2030, 2.5 million tons of Lithium-Ion batteries will have reached end-of-life. Through our NASA-recognised technology developed in India and patented globally, we can effectively recycle the materials in a sustainable manner and extract pure metals that can be ploughed back into the economy. At Attero, we have been futuristic in our approach and initiated Li-Ion battery recycling at our plant in 2019. Through our consistent efforts and R&D focus we have maintained the highest purity (battery grade) and recover efficiency (98%) across various battery materials including Cobalt, Graphite, Lithium, Nickel, Manganese while maintaining lowest Capex and Opex in the world in this space. This is also reflected in our financial performance over the years. We are very excited about the next phase of our journey and ready to replicate our success beyond India. For our international expansion, we will be collaborating with world-class leaders/partners who can support us in establishing our facilities in the US, Europe and Indonesia markets.”

 The company aims to hire more than 100 people by the end of 2022, with plans to increase the number to 200 by the end of 2023. While existing investors include IFC and Kalaari Capital, one would have to assume that the firm has tied up, or is on the verge of tying up fresh funding from newer investors too too, to account for this massive ramp up. Attero has been founded by brothers Rohan and Nitin Gupta.