CATL Increasing Investment Aggressively
Chinese news outlets reported that Chinese EV battery manufacturers announced a total of 22 EV battery plant construction projects in the first quarter of this year and the total investment of the projects is 160 billion yuan.
At present, CATL, the world’s largest supplier in terms of EV battery usage, is building new facilities in China along with BYD, EVE, Svolt, Guoxuan High-Tech, etc. The annual production capacity to be added as a result of the projects is at least 350 GWh, with which approximately 5.95 million high-performance pure EVs can be produced.
It is CATL that is increasing the investment most aggressively. CATL and its subsidiaries are working on seven out of the 22 projects and the total investment in the seven projects amounts to 80.5 billion yuan.
Benefiting from comprehensive assistance from the Chinese government, Chinese EV battery manufacturers are increasing their presence abroad as well. CATL and Svolt are building plants in Europe and BYD is selling its blade batteries to an increasing number of clients.
According to market research firm SNE Research, the global usage of CATL batteries was 8 GWh in January and February this year, up 272.1 percent from a year ago, and its market share soared from 17.3 percent to 31.7 percent in that period. BYD came in fourth with a growth rate of 401.8 percent, CALB seventh with 1,384 percent, and Guoxuan ninth with 153.2 percent.