Who Owns The Power Battery In Ningde Era

With the acceleration of the electric transformation, the power battery has become a key link to support or restrict the large-scale electric transformation of traditional automobile enterprises. Auto giants don't want to be choked by ambitious battery manufacturers, and the competition around power batteries is becoming increasingly fierce. In the subtle competition and game, the strong host plant and the tough battery supplier gradually go deep into each other's hinterland, and the power battery's discourse right has already started.

Volkswagen starts battery cost war

On March 15, Volkswagen group presented its battery strategy and technology map for the next 10 years at its first "power day" event. According to the plan, by 2030, Volkswagen Group will build six Super battery factories with a total annual capacity of 240 GWH in Europe. However, due to the huge investment, not all batteries and cells are produced by Volkswagen itself, and some cells will be supplied by suppliers according to Volkswagen's design and specifications.

It is worth noting that Volkswagen is the second international vehicle manufacturer after Tesla to announce its own battery cell production and self built battery factory.

"The importance of scale in the era of electric vehicles is greater than that in the era of fuel vehicles, because the differences in power systems of electric vehicles will not be too great. The real difference is: whether the product has cost advantage, whether it is of high standard and high quality, and whether it has global scale. " On March 16, chairman of the management board of Volkswagen Group, Mr. DESs, explained the business logic of building a battery factory to reduce costs.

In order to further reduce costs and increase efficiency, another focus of Volkswagen Group is "cell standardization". According to Volkswagen, the standard cell with embedded intelligent technology is planned to be fully launched in 2023, and will cover 80% of the Volkswagen Group's electric vehicles by 2030. Dis predicts that the standard cell will reduce the cost of mass production models by 30%, and the cost reduction ratio will reach 50% in the entry-level models.

"At present, the whole vehicle enterprises are basically building battery factories together with their original battery suppliers, so is Volkswagen. With the increase of scale, the cost is definitely much lower than that of purchasing batteries. This idea is feasible, and this trend will become more and more obvious with the increase of new energy vehicle ownership in the future." On March 22, qingjiao, Secretary General of Zhongguancun new battery technology innovation alliance and director general of battery 100 people's Committee, said in an interview with 21st century economic reporter.

For automobile enterprises, whether to produce batteries independently or to purchase batteries from suppliers has become a new bifurcation, which is related to the discourse power of power batteries. In the face of the global trend of electrification, from frequent layout in the field of power battery to the construction of power battery factory, many vehicle enterprises try to get rid of the "shackles" of battery suppliers, so as to realize "battery freedom".

"Love and kill each other"

Looking back on the development of electric vehicles in recent years, the "love and kill each other" between main engine manufacturers and battery suppliers has long been a track to follow. In the initial stage of electric vehicle application and promotion, automobile enterprises completely rely on the supply of battery manufacturers, and outsourcing batteries become the main means. However, with the expansion of new energy vehicle market demand, this situation has gradually changed.

Major domestic and foreign OEMs have begun to control the battery supply. They may cooperate with several battery manufacturers to ensure the supply of batteries at the same time, or establish joint ventures with battery manufacturers, such as Ningde times, FAW, GAC, Geely, SAIC, Dongfeng and other automobile enterprises to establish battery companies. BYD and Toyota cooperate to explore the development of power batteries, and Volkswagen China enters into the market Guguoxuan High Tech Co., Ltd. has become the largest shareholder. Benz has taken a stake in Funeng technology, etc.; or it has built its own factory and is self-sufficient. Tesla, Daimler and GM are all building their own battery plants.

In fact, the main engine manufacturers and battery manufacturers compete for the power battery discourse power, on the one hand, for the sake of ensuring production capacity and stable supply.

On the other hand, it is subject to cost pressure. As the "heart" of new energy vehicles, power batteries account for 30% to 40% of the vehicle cost. With the decline of subsidies for new energy vehicles and the acceleration of the trend of electrification, battery cost control has become the focus of competition, which is directly related to product competitiveness and single vehicle profit. In order to reduce the cost, purchasing battery cells and producing battery packs by ourselves have become the choice of many automobile enterprises.

"It is a trend for vehicle enterprises to make their own batteries." On March 18, Cui Dongshu, Secretary General of the all China passenger Association, issued a document saying that this is because the cost of batteries accounts for too much, accounting for at least 25% of the vehicle price. In fiscal year 2019, VW's sales revenue reached 252.6 billion euro, and the sales profit reached 6.7%. If we change to battery driven, the cost of the battery will be 100 billion euro, which is too much. If there is no battery profit, Volkswagen's sales profit margin will drop sharply, and the value of Volkswagen will drop sharply.

Fang Jianhua, President of the new energy vehicle venture capital sub fund of the national science and Technology Achievements Transformation Fund, is not optimistic about the future production of batteries by automobile enterprises. "I don't advocate that car companies do their own batteries. With the division of labor in the industry chain becoming more and more detailed, professional people should do professional things."

In Fang Jianhua's view, it is not an inevitable trend for automobile enterprises to make batteries. Some new car makers, such as Weilai, have no such consideration. What they have to do is three things: market and product positioning, system integration and brand. "Vertical integration is actually out of the scope of what auto companies should do. Not all car companies are suitable for making batteries themselves, especially those that do not have the professional ability and the market scale can not reach, and the final result will not be particularly good. "

Escape from "Ningde era"?

In fact, the pattern of power battery has been competing for a long time. A large number of battery enterprises emerged in the early stage of the development of China's power battery industry, but the market has been cleaned up in the past few years. At present, the pattern of China's power battery industry is in a period of dramatic changes: on the one hand, Japanese and South Korean battery enterprises are speeding up the pace of returning to the Chinese market, the tripartite situation of China, Japan and South Korea power battery enterprises has been determined, and Matthew effect is prominent; on the other hand, vehicle manufacturers try to control the electric vehicle industry, improve their bargaining power in the supply chain system, and start to set foot in battery manufacturing and improve production Industry chain layout.

In the new round of reform of automobile industry, the redistribution of interests becomes more and more clear. On the one hand, automobile enterprises need to cooperate with the Ningde era, on the other hand, they want to "escape" Ningde era, grasp more dominant power, and firmly grasp the lifeblood of power battery.

For the car enterprise's mind, Ningde era has already noticed. In May last year, at the performance presentation meeting of Ningde times in 2019, "how to view the impact of self built battery plants in the future?" The question was raised. At that time, pan Jian, vice chairman of Ningde times, responded: "we always believe in the advantages of professional division of labor. The technology, talent and experience accumulation involved in the R & D and production of power batteries are quite different from that of vehicle R & D and manufacturing. We firmly believe that the long-term focus, innovation ability, manufacturing experience and scale of catl will bring about product quality, cost advantage and service on a global scale The more prominent, of course, in this process, vehicle manufacturers will also make various attempts, including the attempt to build their own parts. We do not contradict or worry, and do our own thing well. The electric vehicle industry is a long-term development. "

It is worth noting that in the current situation of battery supply in short supply, the power battery enterprises in the head still have a strong voice, while other second and third tier brand battery enterprises have a relatively weak voice. However, in order to compete for the right to speak and reduce the supply chain risk, the automobile enterprises will also strengthen the support for the second and third tier brand battery enterprises, and the discourse right game is difficult to reach a conclusion at present.

New game technology

With the development of technology, in addition to the battery manufacturers in terms of the production capacity and cost of power batteries, the host plants also launched a new round of competition on battery safety and technical route.

For a long time, LiFePO4 battery and lithium ternary battery are the two main battery technology routes in the global electric vehicle industry.

In 2020, BYD made its blade battery technology popular through acupuncture experiments. After that, BYD's "open and hidden arrow" in the war with Ningde era directly put the line dispute between ternary lithium and lithium iron phosphate in front of the stage. Behind the war between the boss and the second, it is actually a competition for market share.

It is worth noting that the technical and safety issues of power battery can not be ignored behind the line dispute between lithium iron phosphate and lithium ternary battery. Statistics show that in 2020, there are 61 spontaneous combustion / fire accidents reported publicly in China, of which 51 pure electric vehicle accidents have been identified, accounting for 84%. Most of the accident was caused by the problem of power battery.

In the past half a month, the main engine manufacturers have released new battery technologies to define and correct the battery safety. The power battery has been in the limelight for a while: gac-ea released the "magazine battery" on March 10; Volkswagen launched the concept of square "integrated cell" on March 15; BYD launched another "Acupuncture Experiment" on March 16; and Lando free released the first "three-dimensional thermal insulation wall" on March 17 ”Technology, claiming "no smoke, no fire, no explosion"

Fang Jianhua told reporters: "the downfall of main engine plants in succession will have some impact on the pattern of the battery industry. First of all, from the perspective of industrial development, it is unhealthy for China's Ningde era to be the dominant one; second, OEM factories will not tolerate this phenomenon for a long time. For the main engine factory, the most important issue is not the price, but the security significance is not guaranteed. Batteries are the core part of safety. "

"In my opinion, the future battery supply will be diversified. Auto companies will build their own battery factories, purchase batteries, build battery factories with suppliers, and mix and match these three modes for a long time. To be sure, automobile enterprises will pay more and more attention to batteries, which will promote the industry competition and the integration of formats. Although car companies want to control the "three electricity" (battery, motor, electronic control), reduce costs and increase the voice, I personally suggest that specialization and collaborative integration are the best At the end of the Puritanism.

(Editor: Zhang ruosi)