Chinese and Japanese Makers Rolling out Cheaper Products
Chinese and Japanese electric vehicle battery manufacturers are enhancing their competitiveness with inexpensive products, and competition in the global electric vehicle battery market is continuing to intensify.
CATL unveiled a sodium-ion battery on July 29. This battery is lower in price than a lithium-ion battery as it uses less expensive raw materials. CATL’s sodium-ion battery has an energy density of 160 Wh per kilogram and it can be charged by 80 percent in 15 minutes. In addition, it maintains at least 90 percent of its energy density at 20 degrees Celsius below zero. The company said that it would launch a sodium-ion battery with an energy density of more than 200 Wh per kilogram in the future.
Panasonic recently announced that it would more than halve the price of its battery. “We will halve the production cost by next year and by up to 70 percent by 2025,” it said. According to industry sources, the current manufacturing cost of electric vehicle battery packs is about US$100 per Wh and Panasonic’s goal is US$50 or less.
According to market research firm SNE Research, electric vehicle batteries consumed 114.1 GWh worldwide in the first half of this year with CATL batteries accounting for 29.9 percent of the total and followed by those of LG Energy Solution (24.5 percent) and Panasonic (15 percent). In that period, the market share of Panasonic fell whereas those of CATL and LG Energy Solution rose.
At present, South Korean electric vehicle battery manufacturers are trying to lower the prices of their products by reducing the content of cobalt in their relatively expensive high-nickel lithium-ion batteries. LG Energy Solution is planning to initiate the mass production of cobalt-reduced and aluminum-added NCMA batteries in the second half of this year. Samsung SDI is working on a fifth-generation battery with a nickel content of 88 percent or more. SK Innovation is developing NCM9 batteries with a nickel content of 90 percent or so.