On February 14, CATL published an obituary on its official website that Dr. Zhang Yujie, honorary chairman of CATL, died on February 14, 2022 at the age of 79 due to ineffective medical treatment. After this obituary was issued, I believe many people will have a question, that is, who is Zhang Yujie? Yes, before that, the outside world knew very little about Zhang Yujie, honorary chairman of the Ningde era.
Who in the end is Zhang Yujie, who can become the honorary chairman of the trillion -- "King of Ning"? It is understood that Zhang Yujie, whose ancestral home is Tai'an City, Shandong Province, graduated from Taiwan University in mainland China in 1965 and received his doctorate degree from the University of Notre Dame in 1973. After graduating, he worked in for The Ford Motor Company, IBM Corporation, andConner Peripheral in the United States, where he worked in engineering research and development and management.
In addition, the few news is that after the Ningde era landed on the science and technology innovation board with a market value of less than 50 billion yuan in 2018, the Standing Committee of the Ningde Municipal People's Congress awarded Zhang Yujie the title of "Honorary Citizen of Ningde City" at the end of the same year, on the grounds that "Mr. Zhang Yujie has made outstanding contributions to the development of the city's economy, society and leading industries".
According to the Times Weekly news, Zhang Yujie and Zeng Yuqun, chairman of the Ningde Times, are mentor-apprentice relations, and he has single-handedly brought out Zeng Yuqun, and in the rapid development process of the Ningde era, Zhang Yujie can be described as indispensable. Why, it all needs to start with ATL, the predecessor of CATL.
He single-handedly promoted the independence of the Ningde era
Prior to the establishment of ATL, Zhang joined Hong Kong's ST Industrial Co., Ltd. (SAE), a subsidiary of TDK, a well-known Japanese electronics industry brand, in 1994. This was a turning point in his life, where he met Zeng Yuqun, the president of the current Ningde era. At that time, Zeng Yuqun resigned to join SAE less than three months after graduating from Shanghai Jiaotong University and worked in a state-owned enterprise in his hometown, and Zeng Yuqun joined SAE the following year, and Huang Shilin, an old classmate of Zeng Yuqun in Ningde No. 1 Middle School, also joined SAE the following year, which was also the team of the later Ningde era.
In 1999, New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. (ATL) was officially established. In 1999, Zeng Yuqun, Liang Shaokang, Chen Tanghua and others raised US$2.5 million to co-found New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. (ATL) in Hong Kong. The founding members also include Zhang Yujie, Kong Jianwei, Chen Wei and others.
At that time, the reason why Zhang Yujie and Zeng Yuqun and others chose to start a business again was that SAE was unwilling to do lithium batteries, so Liang Shaokang, the president of SAE at that time, encouraged Zhang Yujie, Zeng Yuqun and others to go out to start a business, so there was ATL, the predecessor of the Ningde era.
Thanks to its excellent technology and the ability to tailor batteries for customers, ATL got an order from Apple. In 2004, Apple approached ATL due to the problem of short cycle life of lithium batteries. ATL supplied batteries for the first time for an Apple MP3 and won more than 18 million orders.
In 2002 and 2003, ATL completed two rounds of financing, of which Carlyle Investment in the United States and 3i Group invested $25 million in the United Kingdom. Although the major shareholder suddenly withdrew its capital, atl, which lacked funds, sold to Japan's TDK again for $100 million in June 2005, but it was still run by the original team. With the financial support of TDK and Apple's orders and its own excellent technology, ATL has become the world's first supplier of polymer lithium battery cells in 2012, and a large number of mobile phones and tablets of Apple, Samsung, Huawei, OPPO, VIVO, Xiaomi and other brands use the cells produced by it.
In 2007, Zeng Yuqun and Zhang Yujie and others put forward the idea of "secondary entrepreneurship", building a new energy industry cluster of 100 billion yuan and building a factory in Ningde. In 2008, Zhang Yujie was appointed vice chairman of ATL to study the feasibility of investing in Ningde. In March of the same year, Zhang Yujie and others decided to invest in Ningde and set up a factory in Ningde, with a total investment of 600 million US dollars, ningde new energy technology co., ltd. is the production base of ATL future power batteries and energy storage batteries.
In 2010, after the death of Chen Tanghua, then chairman of ATL, due to illness, Zhang Yujie officially took over the chairmanship, noting that this was a very critical step. In 2011, under the impetus of Zhang Yujie, the ATL power battery research and development department was independent, and Zeng Yuqun officially established Ningde Times New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. (CATL) with Huang Shilin and others.
Due to the pressure on the outlet, and relying on BMW's huge orders, the Ningde era quickly gained a foothold in the power battery market. In just 11 years, CATL has rapidly grown into the world's first battery company, and at present, Tesla, Weilai and Xiaopeng Motors and other head car companies use power batteries produced by CATL. In 2021, the installed capacity of global power batteries in the Ningde era ranked first, reaching 96.7GWh, with a market share of 32.6%, dominating the global power battery market for five consecutive years. Not only that, since its listing in 2018, the stock price of the Ningde era has taken the elevator, and the stock price once exceeded one trillion.
Looking back on the past, although few people have discussed Zhang Yujie's role in the independence and birth of CATL, from the obituary of the Ningde era, "in 2011, Zhang Yujie independently established the ATL power battery research and development department and established catheter new energy technology co., LTD. (CATL)", Zhang Yujie can be said to have personally participated in and witnessed the development of the Ningde era, and built it into a global leading enterprise in the field of lithium-ion batteries in consumer electronics. However, unlike his disciple Zeng Yuqun, who walked to the front of the stage, Zhang Yujie played more of a role as a hero behind the scenes.
The story of ATL and CATL double love and double killing
There is no doubt that without ATL, there is no CATL today, CATL from ATL after the final achievement of trillions of "Ning Wang", and ATL continues to attack the city in its main business, and gradually become a leading lithium battery company in the field of consumer electronics, especially in the field of polymer lithium batteries, occupying about 50% of the global market share. According to non-public data, ATL's operating income in 2020 has exceeded 30 billion yuan.
It's just that consumer electronics will eventually face the ceiling, so ATL finally entered the power battery field after the consumer battery went to the bottleneck. In 2019, ATL established Xinnengan Technology Co., Ltd. (PTL), officially entering the small power market such as household energy storage, power tools, and light electric vehicles, and seems to want to come out again as a company of the same scale as CATL.
For ATL to cut into its own field, the Ningde era did not take advantage of its own momentum to hit ATL, but read the old feelings of the past to help ATL. On April 28, 2021, CATL announced that it signed a joint venture contract with ATL to jointly invest 14 billion yuan to set up two joint venture companies for batteries and battery packs, and will engage in the research and development, production, sales and after-sales service of medium-sized batteries used in the fields of household energy storage and electric two-wheelers in the future.
Not only that, CATL has also signed a cross-technology license agreement with ATL to carry out cross-technical licensing of lithium battery-related technologies developed or obtained by each of them. Under the agreement, ATL would be required to pay CATL $150 million every 12 months for a period of 10 years. Judging from the agreement between CATL and ATL in the Ningde era, CATL will be mainly responsible for the research and development and production of battery cell products in the future, while ATL's subsidiary PTL (Xinnengan) will be responsible for PACK research and development and production and terminal market development.
In fact, at the beginning of CATL' existence, ATL held 15% of CATL's shares. If it were not for the fact that the state had promulgated relevant regulations restricting wholly foreign-owned enterprises from producing power batteries in order to protect China's power battery and new energy automobile enterprises that were just starting out, the CATL shares held by ATL would not have been transferred. Although at ATL transferred this part of the shares in 2015 due to regulations and in order for CATL to be able to go public smoothly and maintain business focus, Zeng Yuqun still held two positions, which shows the harmony of the relationship between the two sides. It was not until March and April 2017 that Zeng Yuqun resigned from all positions at TDK and ATL, and only served as the chairman of CATL, focusing on catl.
For the ATL entry power market, although it is difficult to replicate the miracle of the Ningde era again, for ATL and CATL, whether it is the home storage market, or industrial and commercial energy storage, grid-side energy storage, power generation side energy storage, is a huge market for lithium battery applications, is their unmissable track.
Not only that, for any lithium battery company, should not ignore the joint efforts of ATL and CATL, with the support of the Ningde era, ATL can also quickly make up for the shortcomings and seize the market.
Summary: From the obituary of the Ningde era, it can be seen that Dr. Zhang Yujie has studied in China and the West, has a global strategic vision, has a thorough understanding of science and technology, adheres to the concept that colleagues are family, and cultivates a large number of talents for enterprises and society. For ten years, from the blue wisp of the road to the climbing of the peak, he has always fought side by side with CATL, witnessing one transcendence and victory after another.
The Slovaks are dead, and his spirit is worth learning. It is his unique global vision that clearly sees the general trend of industrial transfer and completes the card slot when the power battery industry rises. He was an important participant and promoter in both atTL and CATL. Now that the Ningde era is encountering challenges, I believe that with the deepening of cooperation between ATL and CATL, I hope that one day ATL and CATL will achieve brotherhood and be invincible.