By Marie Mannes and Alessandro Parodi
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) -Truckmaker Scania is willing to go ahead with purchasing the only profitable business of bankrupt battery maker Northvolt for $6 million, it said on Wednesday.
Northvolt filed for bankruptcy on Wednesday, bringing to an end Europe's best hope of developing a rival to major Asian electric vehicle battery players. Any potential asset sales are also suspended for now.
The Swedish battery maker had for months attempted to sell some of its non-core businesses to try to rescue the main operations that produce battery cells for electric vehicles.
An internal Northvolt memo seen by Reuters said the bankruptcy trustee, appointed by the court to oversee the bankruptcy process, would talk to Scania as well as to any other suitors to determine if a sale can take place.
"It remains to be seen whether elements of the business or its technology will be acquired and continue under new ownership," the memo said.
In February, Northvolt said it had agreed to sell a battery pack business called Northvolt Industrial to one of its largest customers and close partner, Traton-owned Scania for $6 million in cash.
An unknown consortium had made a higher bid and was also willing to buy more assets, but Northvolt said then it was accepting Scania's on the grounds the consortium would require longer for its due diligence and the battery-maker needed cash urgently, filings to the U.S bankruptcy court showed.
Earlier in the week, Northvolt postponed indefinitely a hearing that was set for March 10, and could have led to the Scania takeover.
A Scania spokesperson said the truckmaker still intended to buy the business at the original purchase price it had agreed with Northvolt.
Under the deal, Scania would take over all debt and liabilities belonging to the business, a February filing showed.
The Scania spokesperson declined to comment on the possibility of a third-party coming in and creating a bidding war, calling that speculative.
A Northvolt spokesperson said the company wanted to deliver the transactions that have been negotiated to date.
Northvolt Systems Industrial's battery packs have been sold since 2019 and are used on drilling rigs and in construction to power machinery such as forklifts.
With its main operations in Gdansk, Poland, it counts Swedish mining equipment maker Epiroc and Finnish engineering group Konecranes among its customers.
(Reporting by Marie Mannes and Alessandro Parodi, editing by Essi Lehto, Tomasz Janowski and Barbara Lewis)