Chapter 206 Who is the little lamb?
Chapter 206 Who is the little lamb?
After the two sat down, Zeng Yuqing’s long-accumulated strong curiosity made him ask directly: “Mr. Kang, what is the matter that makes it so mysterious?”
Kang Chi smiled, then took out a mobile phone-sized battery from his pocket and put it on the coffee table.
”Mr. Zeng, guess what this is?”
Zeng Yuqing hurriedly picked it up and looked at it curiously.
”Lithium battery?”
”No, this is a sodium-ion battery.”
Sodium battery? Zeng Yuqing couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed.
No matter what Kang Chi’s real intention was to take out a sodium battery at this time, he believed that sodium batteries had never been the antidote for CATL.
At least not what he wanted to make now, and could make.
In order to call for the development of lithium iron phosphate batteries, BYD’s CEO once said this:
”We cannot change from being strangled by oil in the era of fuel vehicles to being strangled by metal cobalt and nickel in the era of electric vehicles.”
However, what is embarrassing is that the price of lithium carbonate soared to 600,000 yuan per ton in 22 years.
As long as you make lithium batteries, you have to be strangled by raw materials, regardless of whether it is lithium iron phosphate or ternary lithium, regardless of cobalt and nickel, or lithium carbonate.
So that year, sodium batteries were pushed back to the public, and CATL also jumped through the trillion-yuan market value mark with the “sodium battery release”.
However, two years have passed, and the sodium power industry has not yet completed the transformation from 0 to 1.
CATL’s liquid sodium battery project, like solid-state lithium batteries, is still in the laboratory.
And as the price of lithium carbonate gradually returns to rationality, this spare tire seems to have been gradually forgotten.
Sodium batteries seem to be more like a weapon of public opinion used to threaten the price of lithium carbonate…
”If Mr. Kang wants to order sodium batteries from us, I’m afraid you will be disappointed. We don’t have the production capacity of sodium-ion batteries for the time being.”
”Isn’t Mr. Zeng curious about who made this battery?”
”Oh?” After Kang Chi’s reminder, Zeng Yuqing asked curiously, “Who made it?”
”I made it myself.”
”You made it?”
Zeng Yuqing was a little surprised, but it is not difficult to make a battery. The difficulty lies in how to produce it in batches stably, and it is even more difficult to produce high-performance batteries in batches stably.
”Yes, I built a sodium battery production line in Dongyang, which can stably produce 300Wh/kg sodium-ion batteries. The cost is only 75% of that of lithium iron phosphate batteries. If large-scale manufacturing is completed after the industrial chain is formed, the cost is expected to be reduced to 50%!”
”! !?”
Zeng Yuqing was stunned.
In fact, when he heard the words “300Wh/kg sodium-ion battery”, his brain started to shut down. He didn’t listen to what Kang Chi said later…
As the helmsman of the battery giant CATL, Zeng Yuqing’s understanding and judgment of the battery industry will be more sensitive than Kang Chi.
Without Kang Chi’s explanation, Zeng Yuqing clearly realized that
At this moment, the sodium-ion battery in his hand is like an industry nuclear bomb, pointing directly at the global lithium battery industry! Not only CATL, No battery company in the world can survive this tactical nuclear bomb! I thought that what CATL welcomed today was a fat lamb, Who knew that the lamb was holding a nuclear warhead in its pocket! Thinking of this, Zeng Yuqing’s hands couldn’t help but tremble slightly. He carefully put down the battery, as if afraid that it would suddenly explode with a bang…
”Mr. Kang… this joke is not very funny…”
”Do you think I’m joking?”
”…”
Zeng Yuqing was silent for a moment again. Although this thing has the power to completely collapse CATL, on the bright side, Kang Chi brought it to him first, not to use force after courtesy, right? But no matter what, what Kang Chi threw out this time put Zeng Yuqing and CATL into an unprecedented passive situation. Compared with this sodium-ion battery, LG’s lithium battery and Tesla’s decoupling are just as insignificant as a child’s quarrel.
”Can you tell me what you think?”
”It’s very simple. You have two choices. The first one isBecome our OEM, I guarantee that the order volume will make you full. “Kang Chi said calmly, “The second is to reject us and continue to play your lithium battery technology competition game, and then slowly eat up all of them.”
”Mr. Zeng should be very clear that even if the lithium battery technology is more advanced, it can reach 500Wh/kg or even 700Wh/kg, and the battery life can be pushed to two or three thousand kilometers…”
”But in order to improve the battery life, the battery pack is made larger and denser, and then the cost is transferred to the user, so that they need to spend hundreds of thousands to buy the battery pack. This model makes it difficult for new energy vehicles to be truly popularized, so the size of your cake is ultimately limited…”
”Instead of staring at that small cake, it is better to follow our sodium battery replacement model to quickly strengthen and expand the market and collapse LG, Songxia and Tesla. “And you also know that the technologies of sodium batteries and lithium batteries are similar…” “If I use the technology of making this sodium battery to make lithium batteries, the energy density may be able to directly reach 600 or even 700Wh/kg. You actually have nothing to play with. ”
Zeng Yuqing: “…”
He never dreamed that CATL would face the option of ‘becoming a foundry’ one day.
Becoming a foundry means becoming a mere product producer. In the future, they will become an unknown screw behind Kangchi, and all the batteries they manufacture will be labeled Kangchi.
Of course, if you think positively, becoming Kangchi’s younger brother and only making money from product manufacturing may be a bigger piece of cake than what they are eating now.
In any case, this is a very difficult decision for CATL.
After all, not everyone is willing to stay behind the scenes and become someone else’s younger brother, especially as CATL, which once stood at the top of the stage and is still in the limelight.
After a few minutes, Zeng Yuqing replied in a hoarse voice: “Mr. Kang, let me think about it for two days… and such a major matter must be discussed by the board of directors before it can be decided.”
Kang Chi nodded: “I understand. ”
”Can you leave this battery to me?”
Kang Chi smiled and said, “I brought it here specifically for you to study.”
He was not afraid that CATL would reverse engineer the battery technology through a finished product.
If reverse engineering technology was so simple, then no one would sell anything. If they sold anything, they would just sell a finished product and reverse engineer the technology. How could they play?
Especially for products like batteries, which mainly rely on new materials.
Therefore, Kang Chi generously left the battery to CATL, allowing their researchers to analyze it openly and help him prove the reliability of the matter.
And Kang Chi also listened to Zhang Qing’s advice and absorbed what Chief Lu said. Hiding his humble experience, he did not directly bring out the 400Wh/kg technology, but prepared to launch a 300Wh/kg battery first, leaving himself some room for retreat.
Even if it is 300Wh/kg, it is actually enough to promote the battery swap model, and once the battery swap model is rolled out, Kangchi will have a hen that lays golden eggs.
The real money is not in making and selling batteries, but in selling energy.
Batteries are just carriers. Selling electricity through batteries to grab the oil market is the real business that makes money and benefits the people! (End of this chapter)