Belgian chemical group Solvay has acquired DuPont’s Energain lithium-ion high voltage technology for an undisclosed sum. The Brussels-headquartered company said Energain will expand its Special Chem Global Business Unit’s existing portfolio of high-performance salts and additives for electrolytes and strengthen its development capabilities for Li-ion batteries.

Nicolas Cudré-Mauroux, Solvay’s general manager of research & innovation added that the acquisition reinforced the group’s competencies in areas such as modelling and formulations.

The advanced Li-ion battery market is developing rapidly, noted Solvay, driven by increasingly stringent regulations and continuous improvements in performance and cost.

According to a September 2016 report by US-based Transparency Market Research (TMR), a growing shift toward sustainable clean fuels in the automotive sector is a key factor driving the Li-ion battery market. TMR said rising demand for high-power capacity batteries in cars as well as increasing sales of smartphones and other consumer electronics are fuelling growth worldwide. It projects the value of the global Li-ion market to rise from nearly $30 billion in 2015 to more than $77 billion in 2024, showing a compound annual growth rate of 11.6%.