A plan by General Motors and Samsung SDI to spend $3bn on a new US battery plant makes clear South Korean companies’ dominance of the North American EV battery supply chain even in the face of a challenge by their biggest rival, China’s CATL.Aided by tax credits under US president Joe Biden’s flagship climate legislation, South Korea’s three leading battery companies have made themselves integral to EV manufacturing in the US. Of 22 EV models that the US said this month would qualify for the credits, 17 will receive supplies from LG Energy Solution, SK On or Samsung SDI.

All three South Korean groups have set up joint ventures with US carmakers to produce batteries in North America. CATL, on the other hand, has struck a different kind of deal with Ford, which said in February that it planned to license technology from the Chinese battery maker for a proposed $3.5bn factory in Michigan.

While this will mean foregoing some subsidies available under Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, the carmaker will benefit from generous state-level subsidies while securing a supply of relatively low-cost batteries — a deal that could reshape the US battery market and undercut some of the ways that South Korean companies have made inroads.