From the beginning of 2025, MAN Truck & Bus would manufacture high-voltage batteries for electric trucks and buses on large-scale production at its Nuremberg site.
Large-scale Battery Production Scheduled in Mid-2023
The company would invest around 100 million euros over the next five years at the tradition-rich production site for combustion engines. Production capacity would be expanded to above 100,000 batteries per year.
Initially, the batteries, which along with the engines form the heart of electric commercial vehicle drives, would be manufactured manually at the MAN plant in Nuremberg on a small series production for about two and a half years. Construction of large-scale production is scheduled to start in mid-2023 and would be completed by the end of 2024.
MAN is thus laying the foundation for the large-scale industrialisation of electric drive systems for trucks and buses. The commercial vehicle manufacturer is receiving support from the Bavarian State Government, which has promised a contribution of around 30 million euros to energy research and technology funding for the period 2023 to 2027, provided that the funding and budgetary requirements are met. These funds would be used to conduct research in battery assembly, cell chemistry and development, battery safety and ultimately, battery recycling to ensure the sustainability of the propulsion mode.
Alexander Vlaskamp, Chairman of the Executive Board of MAN Truck & Bus SE, says: “We are now starting to industrialise electromobility and continue on our path to climate-neutral mobility in commercial vehicles. It is a ground-breaking location and investment decision for the following decades. At the same time, it is part of MAN‘s transformation to a provider of sustainable transport solutions. This now paves the way for a commercial vehicle e-cluster ‘made in Bavaria’, consisting of the production of e-trucks at MAN in Munich, battery production in Nuremberg, research and development at both locations and excellent cooperation with the respective colleges, universities and institutes. With our investment decision, we are securing around 350 jobs at the Nuremberg site and hundreds if not thousands of jobs in Germany. Such important decisions could only be made in close cooperation with all parties involved from the employer and employees as well as politics.”
The production of heavy e-trucks would start at MAN in Munich at the beginning of 2024. The manufacturer has already put a small series on the road in 2019. MAN also had fully electric city buses and vans on the market for some time.
