GS Yuasa

GS Yuasa Corporation is a Japanese battery manufacturer headquartered in Kyoto, formed in April 2004 through the merger of two long-established makers, Japan Storage Battery (founded 1917) and Yuasa Storage Battery (founded 1918). The combined company is listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the Nikkei 225 index. While GS Yuasa's largest businesses are automotive, motorcycle and industrial lead-acid and lithium-ion batteries, it also produces lithium-ion cells qualified for satellites, aircraft and deep-sea vessels.

Its space battery heritage includes selection as the lithium-ion cell supplier for NASA's Radiation Belt Storm Probes mission (later renamed the Van Allen Probes), a pair of satellites launched in 2012 to study the radiation belts surrounding Earth. Satellite batteries are a thin, specialist layer of the supply chain that most constellation builders buy rather than manufacture in-house, and GS Yuasa is one of only a handful of qualified suppliers worldwide, alongside companies such as Saft and EaglePicher Technologies, both already represented in this directory.

GS Yuasa's space-qualified cells are developed and tested to the same abuse, vibration and thermal-cycling standards used for its aviation and defense battery lines. The company's space-industry customers are satellite and spacecraft integrators seeking flight-proven lithium-ion power storage rather than end users; GS Yuasa does not build spacecraft itself.