Toshiba has quick-charge hybrid car battery-Nikkei

NEW YORK, April 13 (Reuters) - Toshiba Corp (6502.T: Quote, Profile, Research) is ready to mass-produce a quick-charging lithium ion battery for hybrid vehicles with the highest electrical output for a battery of this kind, the financial daily Nikkei said in its Tuesday edition.

The paper said Toshiba has quadrupled the output density of its Super Charge ion Battery, or SCiB, to 3,900 watts. Output density is the power output per kilogram of the battery's weight.

It said the battery can be charged in as little as 90 seconds, making it suitable for plug-in hybrids, and can be recharged more than 10,000 times.

Nikkei said Toshiba has started shipping the battery to major Japanese, U.S. and European automakers on a trial basis.

It said Toshiba has also developed a lithium ion battery with a high energy density aimed at electric vehicles that will be able to discharge power over a long duration and hopes to start sample shipments in the fall.

Nikkei said Toshiba now makes 150,000 SCiBs a month but plans to start building a plant this fall that would make about 2 million batteries a month on start-up, with hopes for expansion to about 10 million by about 2015. (Reporting by Gerald E. McCormick; editing by Richard Chang)