PALO ALTO, U.S. — Tesla’s massive Australian energy-storage facility, which CEO Elon Musk vowed to build quickly after regional outages, will be equipped with battery cells from Samsung SDI instead of main supplier Panasonic. 

The decision to use Samsung SDI is a blow to Panasonic, which has its hands full with orders for electric-vehicle batteries. To meet a self-imposed deadline of 100 days, Tesla turned to the South Korean company since it could swiftly supply the cells. Tesla is importing the cells to the U.S. for final assembly before sending them to Australia — apparently taking the promotional benefits over profit.

Following blackouts last year in South Australia, Musk took to Twitter this March, offering to solve the state’s problems in the form of a bet: “Tesla will get the [battery] system installed and working 100 days from contract signature or it is free.”

The South Australia state government then placed an order for one the world’s largest battery systems, capable of storing 100,000kW — enough to power roughly 30,000 homes. 

Tesla is poised to drastically expand sales of large energy-storage facilities in other regions. The U.S. company is likely to more heavily tap into Samsung SDI’s excess capacity in the future as it grows the business.

Taiwan and other areas that have experienced widespread blackouts are considering purchasing Tesla battery storage as well.

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TAIPEI — The Taiwanese government is planning to approach Tesla to discuss the feasibility of setting up lithium ion battery facilities for storing renewable energy on the island, in line with a project the U.S. technology company recently launched in Australia, a top official said on Thursday following a mass power blackout earlier in the week.

The move would also chime with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s ongoing efforts to replace nuclear power with green energy. Tsai has pledged to make Taiwan nuclear energy free by 2025.

“Tesla is using its lithium ion battery technology to help Australia and California to implement smart grid and grid storage, and we can learn from them in the future,” Taiwan’s Minister of Science and Technology Chen Liang-gee told reporters at his office in Taipei.

“We will try to check out whether there is a suitable solution…we will get in touch with them,” Chen said.

Chen added that the government would send a team of officials to the U.S. to talk with Tesla soon, although he would not be heading the delegation.

He said that the government had not prepared a budget for such a project, although he suggested that a Taiwanese company could potentially form a joint venture with the U.S. tech company for the project.

Tesla, which is also known for its electric cars, declined to comment.

Taiwan was hit by a mass power outage on Tuesday, the largest by number of households affected since a massive earthquake struck in 1999.

The blackout came after government-run petroleum company CPC Corporation ran into difficulties while replacing the power supply for a control system responsible for sending natural gas to a power plant.

A number of tech companies in Taiwan have suffered some minor disruption to production following the outage.

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