CATL officially entered the power exchange business The automobile power exchange standard is expected to achieve "great unification"?

Economic Observation Network reporter Zhou Ju On January 18, Ningde Times, the largest domestic power battery manufacturer, announced that it officially entered the power exchange market. At the online conference held on the same day, CATL released the power exchange brand "EVOGO". According to reports, "EVOGO" will be for all car companies, through a unified battery interface and universal adaptation, for most of the models on the market to provide power exchange services. CATL said that it hopes to build the world's largest power exchange service network in two or three years.

CATL said that its current substation can be applied to passenger cars and logistics vehicles from A00 to C, and is suitable for models developed based on pure electric platforms based on pure electric platforms, which are based on models that have been listed 80% of the world and will be listed in the next 3 years. Its power exchange business is operated by its wholly-owned subsidiary, Times Electric Service. According to Qixinbao's data, Times Electric Service Technology Co., Ltd. was established in August 2021, wholly owned by CATL, with a registered capital of 200 million yuan, and its business scope includes the sale of new energy vehicle power exchange facilities, as well as technology development and services.

The NINGDE Times Replacement Power Station has been adapted to real vehicles, and the first cooperative model is FAW Besturn ANT. NAT is a pure electric MPV model developed by FAW Besturn for the rental, online and other travel markets, and is based on the Pentium FME pure electric platform. CATL said that there will be more models to adapt in the future. Geographically, at the beginning of the Ningde era, ten "small green ring" cities will be selected to provide power exchange services.

Before the Ningde era, there were already some players in the power exchange market, such as Aodong New Energy, and Weilai Automobile, which all built their own substations. CATL said that compared with existing participants, its power exchange mode has its own unique features, that is, it can choose different numbers of batteries according to demand for free replacement.

The battery replacement battery in the Ningde era is called "chocolate power exchange block", which is different from directly replacing the whole battery, users can choose different numbers of batteries freely combined according to the mileage demand to achieve on-demand rental electricity. If you commute within the city, you only need one battery, you can choose to replace only one battery, and if you are traveling long distances, you can choose two and three batteries. The replacement block of the Ningde era adopts a ternary lithium battery, the energy density of a single replacement block is 160Wh/kg, and the battery life is about 200km.

In addition, CATL emphasizes that each of its substations can store 48 replacement blocks, most of which are more than the current storage of substation blocks on the market, which can reduce the waiting time of users. The NINGDE times substation covers an area of about 3 parking spaces, and the replacement time of a single block is about 1 minute.

As a power battery manufacturer, why did CATL choose to enter the power exchange market at this point in time? Chen Weifeng, general manager of Times Electric Service, said in an interview with the media that the research and development of ningde times on power exchange has been pre-studied for many years, starting from this year, Ningde times found that users' anxiety about the mileage has weakened, and the biggest anxiety is the charging time, based on this, Ningde times hope to launch a power exchange service, "We feel that this time point has arrived, which can help more users use new energy vehicles." Chen Weifeng said.

In fact, since the second half of last year, the actions of catheter times in power exchange have been very frequent, not only established times electric services, but also signed agreements with Futian to carry out business cooperation including power stations, and signed cooperation agreements with Guiyang City to build power exchange networks.

The entry of the Ningde era may bring subversive changes to the power exchange market, that is, the unified power exchange business standards. At present, whether it is the Aodong New Energy Replacement Power Station, which mainly serves BAIC BJEV, or the self-built replacement power station of Weilai and other car companies, it was generally due to different standards and fought separately, that is, the charging station could only be replaced for its own brand or specific brand. However, based on the supply cooperation with almost all car companies in batteries, the Ningde era may quickly promote the unification of the industry's power exchange standards.

"The biggest difference between us doing this and others is that we hope to be able to adapt to various models, which is also an advantage for us, because we do services and supporting for various car companies, so our chocolate exchange block can basically be technically adapted to most of the models developed by the all-electric platform on the market." Chen Weifeng said.

For car companies, if there is a standard and unified power exchange mode, it is not necessary to customize the battery replacement for each model, saving research and development time and cost, and does not have to invest heavily in self-built replacement power stations. On the purchase side, almost all brands can achieve "car-electricity separation", users no longer need to buy batteries, the cost of car purchase has dropped significantly, or can stimulate car sales to increase.

However, the Ningde era also faces some challenges in entering the field of power exchange. The first is the problem of profitability that has been criticized for switching electricity before, due to the large investment in the early stage and the low frequency of power exchange. In this regard, Chen Weifeng said, "From the perspective of the commercial plan of the Ningde era, the more cars the replacement power station, the opportunity to achieve profitability, if there is no car, the replacement power station is indeed very miserable, and if more models are standardized to replace the battery, we are still more confident." ”

Another challenge is the shift from battery manufacturers to service operators. Chen Weifeng admitted that the biggest risk of CATL's entry into power exchange is that it has no experience in service operation, because this will be the company's transformation from facing the B-end to directly facing the C-end.

Overall, the power exchange market continues to be encouraged by policies and has great market prospects. Guojin Securities expects that in 2025, the mainland substation is expected to reach 22,000 seats, the operating market size is expected to reach 263.1 billion yuan, and the substation equipment market is expected to reach 69.3 billion yuan, corresponding to the compound annual growth rate of the construction, operation and power exchange equipment of the substation from 2021 to 2025 to reach 80%-107%.