# QuantumScape $3.3 billion IPO, can Ilika plc’s Goliath compete?

- Link: https://www.directorstalkinterviews.com/quantumscape-3.3-billion-ipo-can-ilika-plcs-goliath-compete/412938706
- Published: 2020-11-17T15:57:48+00:00
- Author: Giles

**QuantumScape** (NYSE:QS) due to go public in the fourth quarter and agreed to 
merge with Kensington Capital (KCAC). The electric-car stock will trade on the New
York Stock Exchange under the ticker QS.

The enterprise value of the new company is estimated to be worth $3.3 billion. The
company builds solid-state lithium-metal batteries, which some believe are safer
than conventional liquid-state batteries.

DirectorsTalk caught up with Graeme Purdy CEO of **[Ilika plc](https://www.directorstalkinterviews.com/company/ilika-plc/ika.l)**(
[LON:IKA](https://www.directorstalkinterviews.com/company/ilika-plc/ika.l)) to ask
if its Goliath solid-state batteries can compete with such well-funded competition.

> **Graeme Purdy told us,** “Well, if you look at the roadmap of some of our competition,
> they are not dissimilar to the ones that we’ve been publicising and talking to
> partners about so in terms of the availability of our Goliath prototypes for evaluation,
> we’re very much on the same track.
> One of the reasons for QuantumScape’s large, planned IPO is that actually they’re
> planning to build their own, let’s call it a ‘Gigafactory’ with the capacity to
> be able to manufacture those batteries. So, rule of thumb is that these plants
> cost between half a billion US to 750 million US per gigawatt hour, so they’re
> big investments. That’s part of the reason why QuantumScape are raising such a
> large amount of capital in order to fund that.
> We’ve chosen a different route in that we will be going through the UKs national
> facility, the UKBIC, as the first step and then scaling up through a JV with an
> existing cell manufacturing company to get to the gigawatt scale.
> So, we haven’t quite got the same demands for capital investment and I believe
> that we’ve got a very skilled, perfectly formed, development team in our organisation
> and we’ve made great progress over the last six months and expect further progress
> going forward.”

Ilika plc is a pioneer in a ground-breaking solid state battery technology able 
to meet the specific demands of a wide range of applications in MedTech, Industrial
IoT, Electric Vehicles and Consumer Electronics.

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