Buffett’s Duracell Sued by BASF Over Lithium Ion Battery Secrets

Billionaire investor Warren Buffett’s Duracell battery maker was accused by chemical producer BASF SE of stealing trade secrets about lithium ion battery technology.

BASF, the world’s biggest chemical maker by revenue, claims in a lawsuit that Duracell, owned by Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway since 2016 – misappropriated the technology while the companies had a cooperation agreement. Duracell is one of the top-selling battery producers in the U.S., and lithium ion batteries are used to power electric cars, consumer electronics and energy storage devices.

“Duracell’s misappropriation of BASF’s trade secrets and its breach of the collaboration agreement has caused and will continue to cause BASF irreparable harm and damages,” the chemical company said in the complaint, filed in federal court in Delaware and unsealed Tuesday. BASF is asking for monetary damages and an order that Duracell destroy all documents it got as part of the pact.

A Duracell spokesperson said in a statement that it will vigorously defend against the “baseless suit.”

“Duracell’s innovative battery chemistry was developed through years of work and significant investment by our internal R&D team and is the subject of numerous Duracell patents,” according to the statement.

The suit comes as the German company is pushing to produce materials used in lithium ion batteries from recycled metals at a Michigan-based plant to cut carbon dioxide emissions. Chief Executive Officer Markus Kamieth has been repositioning BASF to counter high energy prices and a decline in demand, particularly in China. Kamieth is converting the battery materials division into a stand-alone business, and the company said last year it was “exploring opportunities for collaborations” in that line of business.

BASF has launched a cost-cutting effort at its Ludwigshafen site, Europe’s biggest chemical plant, where by February it had already started closing some smaller production units, and is on track to curtail annual costs by €2.1 billion ($2.32 billion) by the end of 2026.

In its suit, BASF said it has “invested substantial resources and efforts in creating and refining a proprietary and trade secret process for producing high-performance cathode material,” which it says is a “crucial battery component.”

The company contends it shared its proprietary technology with Duracell only as part of the collaboration agreement, in which both sides agreed to keep the innovations secret. It claims Duracell improperly shared the technology with an unidentified third company.

As a result, BASF lost its role as developer and supplier, “undercutting the financial benefit to BASF for its development efforts,” the company claims.

The case is BASF Corp. v. Duracell U.S. Operations, 25-cv-404, US District Court, District of Delaware (Wilmington).