An electric vehicle battery plant in China jointly-owned by South Korean conglomerate SK Innovation has been closed since January, the company said, making it the latest South Korean battery maker to run into troubles in China as Beijing boosts domestic producers.

韩国企业集团SK创新(SK Innovation)称，其在中国合资拥有的一家电动汽车电池厂从1月份关闭至今。这使该公司成为最新一家在北京方面促进国内生产企业发展之际陷入困境的韩国电池厂商。

The company confirmed the halt in operations to the Financial Times on Friday, after local media reported the closure. The plant was a joint-venture with two Chinese companies in which SK Innovation owns a roughly 40 per cent stake. SK said its Chinese partners had decided to halt production but had not provided a clear explanation, write Tom Hancock and Kang Buseong.

在当地媒体报道关厂的消息后，该公司周五向英国《金融时报》证实了停产的情况。该厂是与两家中国公司合资组建的，SK创新拥有约40%股权。SK称，其中国合资伙伴决定停产，但迄今没有提供清楚的解释。

Trade tensions between South Korea and China have spiked in recent months over Thaad, a US-designed missile defence system being installed by Seoul, with Beijing pressuring South Korean businesses. But SK Innovation said “we don’t think that the decision is just because of China’s economic retaliation out of Korea’s Thaad deployment”.

韩国和中国之间的贸易紧张在近几个月急剧上升，焦点问题是“末段高空区域防御系统”(THAAD，中文简称：萨德);首尔方面正在部署这种美国设计的导弹防御系统，而北京方面正向韩国企业施压。但SK创新表示“我司不认为这一决定只是因为中国针对韩国部署萨德发起的经济报复”。

South Korean media reported that the China plant, which assembles battery cells produced in Korea, generates annual revenues of about Won50bn ($45m), and said the production halt was due to Chinese regulations favouring domestic producers, which slowed orders at the end of last year.

据韩国媒体报道，这家中国工厂把韩国生产的电芯组装成电池，其年度营收约为500亿韩元(合4500万美元)。根据这些报道，停产是由于中国出台了向国内生产商倾斜的法规，导致去年底订单放缓。

China last year released a list of companies allowed to supply batteries in the country which excluded foreign manufacturers. That has disappointed South Korea’s Samsung SDI and LG Chem, who both opened large battery plants in China in hopes of serving the country’s EV market — the world’s largest.

中国去年发布了允许在国内供应电池的公司名单，没有一家外国制造商被列入这份名单。这让韩国的三星SDI(Samsung SDI)和LG化学(LG Chem)失望，这两家韩资企业都在中国开设了大型电池厂，希望能够为全球最大的电动车市场服务。

Meanwhile Taiwanese Apple assembler Foxconn announced this week it would invest approximately $145m for a 1.2 per cent stake in China’s fastest growing electric vehicle battery manufacturer, Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL), in what it called a “long term investment”. The deal values the privately-owned company at about $12bn.

与此同时，台资的苹果(Apple)装配商富士康(Foxconn)本周宣布，将投资约1.45亿美元购得宁德时代新能源科技公司(CATL) 1.2%股权，作为一笔“长期投资”。宁德是中国发展最快的电动汽车电池制造商，这笔交易对这家非上市公司的估值达到大约120亿美元。