Li-Cycle Holdings Corp.

Good day, everyone. My name is Todd, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the second quarter 2023 Lifecycle Holdings Earnings Call and Webcast. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question at that time, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. If you should need operator assistance, please press star zero. Thank you. I will now turn the call over to Nala Azmi, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, and thank you, everyone, for joining us today for Lifecycles Review of our business and financial results ended June 30, 2023. We will start today with formal remarks from Ajay Kochhar, Co-Founder, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Tim Johnston, co-founder and executive chairman, and Debbie Simpson, chief financial officer. We will then follow with a Q&A session. Ahead of this call, Lifecycle issued a press release and a presentation, which can be found on the industrial relations section of our website at investors.lifecycle.com. On this call, management will be making statements based on current expectations, plans, estimates, and assumptions, which are subject to significant risks and uncertainties, most of which are difficult to predict and many of which are beyond the control of lifecycle. Actual results could differ materially from our forward-looking statement if any of our key assumptions are incorrect, including because of factors discussed in today's press release, during this conference call, and in our past reports and filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Ontario Securities Commission in Canada. These documents can be found on our website at investors.lifecycle.com. We do not undertake any duty to update any forward-looking statements, whether written or oral, made during this call or from time to time, to reflect new information, future events, or otherwise, except as required. With that, I'm pleased to turn the call to Ajay.

Thank you, Nella, and good morning, everyone. I'm excited to discuss the progress our team has made during the second quarter as we continue to advance the implementation of our spoken hub network strategy. Lifecycle continues to capitalize on strong secular trends and supportive government policy. Our plans to grow our network will position Lifecycle to become the top global recycling producer of lithium carbonate and key battery grade materials, establishing Lifecycle in a leading role in the electrification ecosystem. Beginning with slide three, I would like to cover some of the key highlights of our progress, which we'll discuss in greater detail in this call. On the commercial front, we signed a Memorandum of Understanding to collaborate and explore lithium-ion battery recycling solutions with EVE Energy, one of the world's largest lithium-ion battery cell manufacturers. From an operational perspective, we continue to build strong momentum for our spoken-up business. At our Rochester hub in North America, we significantly advanced construction with continued expectation of the start of commissioning in late 2023. For the development of the Port of Esme hub, our first in Europe, we progressed the work on the definitive feasibility study with Glencore and expected to be completed by mid-2024. And our first European spoke began operations with the startup of Line 1 in August, with Line 2 expected to follow in late 2023. Finally, on the financial front, we're also pleased to report that we are at the final stages of completing our process with the DOE Loan Programs Office, or LPO, and expect to close the $375 million loan in September 2023. Turning to slide four, I'll discuss Lifecycle's global Spoken Hub portfolio and our continued progress in executing on our global network growth strategy. As illustrated on the left of this slide, With significant gigafactory capacity projected to come online, we expect to see meaningful demand growth for recycling of all forms of lithium-ion batteries in both North America and Europe. Aligning with key battery supply chain customers, we're expanding our global commercial footprint by strategically localizing our network close to demand centers and customers. In this current portfolio, we expect to achieve pre-processing capacity in excess of 100,000 tons per of lithium-ion battery equivalent and post-processing capacity of 85,000 to 105,000 tons of black mass per year. Importantly, and to put it into context, once the Rochester and Port of Esme hubs are in full operation, these facilities will have total lithium carbonate production capacity of up to 25,000 tons per year. With this first mover advantage, Lifecycle is uniquely positioned to become a leading global and sustainable producer of lithium carbonate and other key battery grade materials. Turning to slide five for discussion on the EVE MOU and Hungary Spoke site selection. EVE is one of the world's largest lithium ion battery cell manufacturers with global facilities and customers that include major OEMs such as BMW and Bosch. In July, we entered into an MOU for global sustainable recycling solutions for EVEs with my battery materials. Consistent with our spokes strategy, capital investments are underpinned by multi-year commercial contracting combined with accelerating local market demand. Accordingly, we're excited to be exploring site selection in Hungary with expected scope, scale, and timing to be completed by early 2024. EVE, with its recently announced plans to build its first European battery manufacturing facility in Hungary, will serve as an anchor customer. Additionally, we expect to add OEM customers in the region, given Hungary is projected to be one of the largest battery cell manufacturing markets in Europe by the end of the decade. Let me now turn it over to Tim for a more detailed update on our Spoke and Hub network.