Will the employees of Northvolt’s future Quebec battery cell factory be content to tighten bolts while research and innovation take place in Sweden?
I caricature, of course. But some observers fear that the billions that our governments deploy in the battery sector will mainly be used to support manufacturing activities. And they don’t do much to solve the big problem of the Quebec economy: its lack of innovation.
I addressed this question in a recent column1.
I have since discussed it with Julie Beauchemin, director, operational efficiency, at Northvolt. I catch Mme Beauchemin on Teams on a train after she had just left the Swedish town of Västerås, where the Northvolt laboratory is located.
The coincidence is interesting since this laboratory is exactly the kind of industrial research infrastructure that I dream of seeing in Quebec. This is where we test ideas, invent processes, and generate intellectual property.
No, the Swedish Northvolt laboratory will not move to Quebec. Butme Beauchemin assures me that the company will do more than just assembly in the province.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY JULIE BEAUCHEMIN
Director, operational efficiency at Northvolt, Julie Beauchemin
We want to become a catalyst in Quebec society. We want to develop innovation, we really want to play this role.
Julie Beauchemin, director, operational efficiency, Northvolt
The company cites as proof a partnership with Concordia University’s Volt-Age program announced Tuesday. The agreement involves exchanges of researchers and professionals and joint research activities. The objective: to design batteries that are greener, more energy dense and faster to recharge.
“Less than a year after our presence in Quebec, I find that our collaboration with the Volt-Age program is a concrete manifestation of this desire to push research and create a pool of talent,” argues Mme Nice path.
I called the researcher who heads Volt-Age, Professor Karim Zaghib. He has been researching batteries for four decades. What will this partnership with Northvolt bring?
“I want to do research that generates significant and useful benefits for society,” he answers. We want to move from idea to innovation, then from innovation to commercialization and industrialization. But when you are alone in the laboratory, you can make mistakes, you are not guided. A big player like Northvolt can say: here are my objectives, here are my needs. And we can tie ourselves to it. »
The partnership with Northvolt will also provide research funding and industrial experience opportunities for its students. The researcher also anticipates that his team will expand from 12 students currently to 35, or perhaps 50. However, no amount has been announced as part of the partnership.
Mme Beauchemin says other agreements will be established with CEGEPs and universities to train some of the 3,000 employees who will work at the McMasterville battery cell factory.
At first I had the impression that we were a bit off topic here. If the Northvolt company wants to help train people who will work for it or elsewhere in the battery sector, so much the better for it. But how will this propel innovation in Quebec?
Mme Beauchemin draws a parallel for me with the video game industry and the arrival of Ubisoft in Montreal in 1997.
“At the time, there were almost no programs for people who wanted to work there,” she recalls. More than 25 years later, there are training programs at all levels. And what we see is that these people have not only worked at Ubisoft. There are dozens of studios that have been set up. There is artificial intelligence, digital technologies. It created a much broader innovation ecosystem than we could have initially thought, and it’s thanks to the fact that we trained people with this knowledge. »
PHOTO JACQUES BOISSINOT, CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
Ubisoft premises, in Quebec
That’s an interesting point. It remains to be seen whether training operators and technicians will have a similar effect to training programmers.
Julie Beauchemin affirms that batteries are a technology in full development and that we will need research and development people at the McMasterville plant, not just in Sweden.
“What we learned in Sweden is that we need proximity between researchers and production. […] “Will it be Swedish researchers who come here? Will people from Quebec go to train in Sweden and come back when the product is launched? We don’t know yet,” she says.
Northvolt also reiterated its desire to source from local suppliers, both for raw materials and equipment. “But there are standards that will be required,” warns Mme Nice path. This is in line with the message Investissement Québec conveys to Quebec entrepreneurs and which I reported in my previous column. A message that said: get ready!
Verdict?
There are some interesting elements in what M reportsme Beauchemin and I am the first to hope that Northvolt and other multinationals in the battery sector will forge links with researchers here and propel innovation in Quebec. However, I know that between the intentions put forward by foreign companies and reality, there is often a gap. In the 1980s, the Canadian government adopted patent rules favorable to pharmaceutical companies in exchange for a promise that they would invest 10% of their revenues in research and development here. However, the industry has never respected its part of the commitment. With the battery sector, there are no similar requirements or even targets to achieve. It is therefore a complete profession of faith that we make with regard to Northvolt and company. It seems to me that with the public billions granted in financial aid, we could have achieved solid agreements instead of this leap into the void.
1. Read the column “Will the battery industry drive innovation? »
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