QuantumScape Corporation

Good day, and welcome to QuantumScape's fourth quarter 2023 earnings conference call. John Sager, QuantumScape's vice president of capital markets and FP&A, you may begin your conference.

Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, and thank you to everyone for joining QuantumScape's fourth quarter 2023 earnings call. To supplement today's discussion, please go to our IR website at ir.quantumscape.com to view our shareholder letter. Before we begin, I want to call your attention to the safe harbor provision for forward-looking statements that is posted on our website as part of our quarterly update. Forward-looking statements generally relate to future events, future technology progress, or future financial or operating performance. Our expectations and beliefs regarding these matters may not materialize. Actual results and financial periods are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. There are risk factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from the content of our forward-looking statement for the reasons that we cite in our shareholder letter, Form 10-K, and other SEC filings, including uncertainties posed by the difficulty in predicting future outcomes. Joining us today will be QuantumScape's co-founder, CEO, and Chairman Jagdeep Singh, our CFO, Kevin Hetrick, and Dr. Siva Sivaram, President. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Jagdeep.

Thanks, John. Since our founding, our mission has been simple, revolutionize energy storage and enable a more sustainable future. Reflecting on this journey, we've made remarkable progress towards commercializing solid state lithium metal batteries from the single layer pouch cells we showed in December 2020, all the way to our 24 layer A0 cells shipped in December 2022. The best performing of these have now yielded impressive cycle life performance over a thousand cycles with 95% capacity retention, as reported by Volkswagen's battery-armed Powerco, based on testing in their own labs in Germany. In 2023, we set out to turn these A0 prototypes into a commercial product, and with advances in cathode loading, packaging efficiency, and process quality, we now have our first commercial product, QSE5, in our sights. When it comes to the combination of product development, customer engagement, and financial strength, I believe our leadership in next generation batteries is stronger than it's ever been. When we begin shipping QSC5, it will mark a world first for automotive solid state lithium metal battery technology, representing the culmination of years of development on the part of the QuantumScape team and further solidifying our leadership in next generation battery technology. But starting low volume production of our first product is not the end of the journey. It's just the beginning. To truly fulfill the promise of our breakthrough technology, we will need to increase production by orders of magnitude from where we are today. For that reason, early last year, I set out to recruit a leader with extensive experience in high volume manufacturing of sophisticated technology products. Such a candidate would need to have extensive experience bringing complex emerging technology into high volume production, a proven track record of operational discipline, and an appreciation for the significance of QuantumScape's mission and the scale of our ambition. I believe our company is closer than ever to having a profound impact on the automotive industry and the wider world while delivering exceptional returns for shareholders. I was looking for a leader who both shared that vision and had the tools to make it a reality. I'm pleased to say we found the ideal candidate in Dr. Siva Sivaram. He has decades of experience taking groundbreaking technology products into high volume production, building factories, establishing partnerships, and scaling production across the world. Since coming on as president, Siva has impressed the team with his operational skills, strategic vision, and ability to drive results, as well as his connections within the broader high-tech manufacturing industry. Most importantly, he fits in perfectly with the culture we've worked hard to build and the values we all hold, respect, curiosity, integrity, and passion to solve the problem of building a better battery. That's why as chairman, I'm thrilled to announce that with my recommendation, the board has agreed to appoint Dr. Siva Sivaram as chief executive officer. I have total confidence that he's the right person to take on the challenge of bringing our transformational solid state battery technology to market, driving this next phase of growth, fulfilling our mission of revolutionizing energy storage, and delivering exceptional returns for shareholders. There's no doubt in our minds that Siva is the right person at the right time to lead us on to the next phase of our journey. With that, let me turn it over to you, Siva. Congratulations.