KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia-based copper wire producer Ta Win Holdings expects its proprietary technology and a new manufacturing plant to bring fresh opportunities as more electric vehicle (EV) makers head to Southeast Asia.
Managing director Ngu Tieng Ung told Nikkei Asia that demand for Ta Win products is already booming now that low-cost Southeast Asia is becoming an EV production hub.
There are a number of reasons why makers of EVs and the batteries that power them are increasingly attracted to Southeast Asia.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo is using his country’s huge deposits of nickel, a key battery material, to position Southeast Asia’s largest economy as a major link in the EV supply chain.
Vietnamese automaker VinFast, meanwhile, plans to cease production of internal combustion engine cars by the end of this year and manufacture only EVs.
Via subsidiary Cyprium Wire Technology, Ta Win in November began building Malaysia’s first privately owned electron beam irradiation plant. The factory is part of Ta Win’s production facility in Alor Gajah, Melaka.
The plant’s construction and manufacturing technology is being handled by CGN Dasheng Electron Accelerator Technology, a subsidiary of China General Nuclear Power Group.
Electron beam irradiation technology will enable the production of irradiation cross-linked wire and cable products capable of withstanding temperatures up to 300°C, according to Ta Win. That is significantly higher than standard electrical wire and cables with plastic material insulation, which can withstand up to 105°C before starting to melt.
Irradiation cross-linked wire lasts up to 25 years, compared with an average range of five to seven years for products with standard insulation, according to the wire maker. Irradiation cross-lined wire also resists abrasions, fire, oil and acid better.
Ngu said that once completed, the plant will help Ta Win supply the global EV industry with irradiated cross-linked wire as well as cable products that utilise Ta Win’s patented electron beam cross-linked technology.
The plant will have the capacity to produce 420km of irradiation cross-linked wire and cable per day. An EV requires 6km to 8km of wire, “of which up to 70% has to be high-voltage,” Ngu said from the company’s headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.
“Being the first privately held high voltage copper wire producer in the region,” he said, “we stand a very bright chance … queries have started to come in.”
The plant is expected to be completed by June, and Ngu said two more production facilities will be finished within 24 months.
“This certainly puts us on track to continue accelerating our foothold in the global EV supply chain and strengthening our long-term prospects moving forward,” he said.
Bursa Malaysia-listed Ta Win, which has a market cap of about US$100 million (RM418 million), currently supplies copper wire rod to US-based Tesla and Toyota via Ireland-based auto parts supplier Aptiv’s global vendor programme. Aptiv’s customers include 23 of the world’s 25 largest original equipment manufacturers of automobiles.
Ta Win also has an exclusive sales contract with Posco International, South Korea’s largest trading house, to supply copper wire rod to South Korea-based copper foil makers. The contract, worth about RM2.7 billion, is to supply 65,000 metric tons of copper products over three years to major Posco customers lljin Materials and SK Nexilis.
Ngu said the company is currently making ordinary copper rods that are processed into foil for EV batteries.