This morning (November 28), some media revealed that Xiaopeng Motors will develop its own battery, and has recruited Zhong Liang, a former senior battery engineer at BMW , to serve as senior battery technology director in Xiaopeng Motors. But soon, at noon, there were rumors that Xiaopeng denied the related battery self-development related plans. The company is currently firmly focusing on the main automobile business, controlling costs and improving operational efficiency. However, when I checked Xiaopeng Motors’ social media, I did not find that Xiaopeng made a statement about the self-developed battery.
In fact, the rumors that Xiaopeng will develop its own battery is not groundless. On November 6 this year, Guangzhou Pengbo Automobile Technology Co., Ltd. was established with a registered capital of 5 billion yuan. The legal representative of the company is Xiaheng , one of the co-founders of Xiaopeng Motors. Its business scope includes engineering and technical research and experimental development, automobile parts and accessories manufacturing, battery manufacturing, etc. The emergence of this new wholly-owned subsidiary of Xiaopeng , , was immediately considered by the outside world to be a signal of self-developed batteries.
Currently, the power battery of electric vehicles accounts for about 60% of the production cost of the whole vehicle. In the first half of this year, due to the rise in battery raw materials prices, a number of new energy vehicle companies forced to raise prices to deal with it. Currently, there are two giants in domestic battery manufacturers, namely CATL and BYD . If car companies want to obtain high-performance power batteries, they can choose to cooperate with these two manufacturers or independently develop them.
If car companies generally choose the path of independent research and development in order to gain more say in battery production and supply. However, manufacturing batteries is different from manufacturing cars. It belongs to a cross-professional chemical materials system, so the investment in independent battery research and development by car companies should not be underestimated.
At the beginning of this year, NIO CEO O Li Bin announced that it would assemble a 400-person battery team and plan to load and deliver the vehicle in 2024. It will be launched by the Alps with Weixinyan batteries. At the end of October, NIO invested 2 billion yuan to establish a battery technology company, and the legal representative of is Zeng Shuxiang, the head of NIO's battery industry. NIO has initially planned to build a pilot line for self-developed batteries in Hefei, which is expected to be completed by the end of next year. The pilot line usually can supply hundreds of vehicles per month.
In addition to NIO and Xiaopeng, domestic auto companies such as GAC, Great Wall, and Geely have related plans for self-developed batteries or self-made batteries. The honeycomb battery incubated by Great Wall is about to be launched on the IPO. GAC issued an announcement in August this year stating that it will invest 10.9 billion yuan to build a battery manufacturing production line. At the same time, foreign auto companies such as Tesla , Volkswagen, General Motors, and Ford have all invested heavily in self-developed battery plans.
Editor said: has an excellent battery technology and can even be produced by itself, which is definitely an advantage for a car company, such as BYD's blade battery and Tesla's 4680 battery. At the same time, realizing self-producing of batteries can better control the production cost of batteries and balance the risks of procurement and self-producing. For car companies like Xiaopeng and NIO, which specialize in the pure electric vehicle route, self-developed self-made batteries are definitely an option that cannot be avoided. However, the research and development of power batteries is difficult and the investment of R&D costs are also high. This is definitely a great challenge for car companies with "zero experience" in this regard. Therefore, there is a prerequisite for self-developed batteries, that is, the car company must have a certain scale, and Xiaopeng does not currently meet this condition. But NIO is different. The particularity of its circuit replacement determines that it has a more urgent need for self-developed batteries. Xiaopeng's R&D focus is on intelligent driving. If Xiaopeng is distracted from battery research and development, it will lengthen the front line, which will be a bigger test for the company's cash flow .
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