According to Electrive, Lilium plans the release the electric vertical take-off plane sometime in 2025.

Zenlabs' project, which is currently being under development in California, focuses on finding suitable materials that are able to form a stable passivation layer on the anode and the cathode.

The new materials should be able to solve the problems related to energy-density and high-cost in EV batteries.

Steve Zimmer, executive director of the Council for Automotive Research, said that "the low-cost/fast-charge contract award with Zenlabs is part of USABC’s broad battery technology research and development program."

Since it invested in Zenlabs back in 2021, Lilium has the rights to use the new technology when it will be ready in its new vertical take-off aircraft, the Lilium eVTOL, which should be coming in the next few years.

Company officials stated that "our team scouted more than 100 companies along the entire battery value chain from raw material suppliers through to cell developers, manufacturers, and recycling companies."

"Based on that research, we concluded that Zenlabs’ pouch cells, lithium-ion batteries using high-silicon anode and high-nickel cathode, offered the best solution for achieving our needs through performance, certification, and into scale production", the company added.

Lilium wants its upcoming electric plane to be able to achieve a 175-kilometer range, with a 10 second vertical launching time and a 45 second landing duration.

The company is confident that Zenlabs' technology will be able to deliver on these promises, since it should offer some 2.500 watts of power per kg during take-off and the landing and some 250 watts while cruising.

The team is confident that this power usage will result in 20% power remaining in the batteries.

Customcells will be manufacturing the cells that will go in Lilium's electric plane after the cell technology will receive approval from the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).