In response to a rumor that "Tesla stopped cooperating with BYD in the field of blade batteries", on March 14, BYD clarified to a reporter from China Fund News: false information, inconsistent with the actual situation. The news also caused some disturbance to the secondary market. In early trading on the 14th, BYD's A-share share price fell by 3.1%.
As of press time, at about two o'clock in the afternoon, BYD's stock price has turned red.
However, it should be noted that in the first two months of this year, the rapid growth of BYD's power battery installation is an indisputable fact. Especially in February this year, it has rapidly narrowed the market share gap with CATL.
BYD: The news is not true
It is understood that the rumor originally originated in the South Korean media. On March 14, the Korea Economic Daily quoted industry sources as saying that earlier this year, after the supply agreement between Tesla and BYD expired, Tesla did not require BYD to supply additional batteries for some Tesla Model 3 vehicles.
The news also made three speculations about the reason, one may be considering the problem of the blade battery itself, the second is the United States' subsidies for electric vehicles, and the third is the competition between BYD and Tesla and other factors, Tesla and BYD after the expiration of the contract, no longer require continued supply.
The report said Tesla's dependence on LG Energy will become stronger, Tesla uses LG Energy and CATL products in Europe, and Panasonic products in North America, these companies may fill BYD's vacancy. LG Energy Solutions is said to be accelerating the development of lithium iron phosphate batteries for electric vehicles at Tesla's request, because Tesla's upcoming cheaper models have greater demand for lithium iron phosphate batteries.
However, for the above news, BYD denied it. The company told reporters that the news was false information and did not match the actual situation.
Second generation blade battery or launch within the year?
BYD and Tesla have been in a "hazy" state in terms of blade battery supply. As early as August 2021, it was reported that BYD would provide Tesla with blade batteries in the second quarter of 2022, and the blade batteries would be the first to be installed on Tesla Model Y models, but the two sides did not respond to this at that time.
However, in June 2022, BYD executives revealed in an interview with the media that BYD will provide battery products for Tesla, which is also the first official response to the cooperation between the two.
According to the data, BYD's first-generation blade battery was released in March 2020, using the lithium iron phosphate route with an energy density of 140Wh/kg. In the industry's view, at that time, blade batteries in the energy density is compared with ternary lithium batteries is no advantage, the current mainstream ternary lithium battery energy density has reached 180Wh/kg, some even more than 200Wh/kg, such as the Ningde era equipped with the Ni55 battery on the extreme krypton 001 is 250Wh/kg.
However, it is reported that BYD's second-generation blade battery will be launched as soon as 2023, and the energy density may reach 180 Wh/kg. Although the previous blade battery energy density is low, the endurance of the model it is equipped with is not much different from ternary lithium, such as the BYD Han model, the battery capacity is 77kWh, and the NEDC range can reach 605km.
This is because blade batteries have made innovations in structure and process compared to traditional lithium iron phosphate batteries. A research report by Guotai Junan also shows that the blade battery developed by BYD has greatly improved the endurance of lithium iron phosphate batteries by improving the utilization rate through de-modulation while retaining the safety of the original lithium iron phosphate battery.
Tesla bet on the 4680 large cylindrical battery
Tesla, on the other hand, has been cooperating with Japanese Panasonic battery manufacturers until 2019 to purchase ternary lithium batteries from Panasonic. Until 2019, Tesla Model 3 began to be localized, at this time in cooperation with South Korean manufacturer LG New Energy began to use lithium iron phosphate batteries. In 2020, it reached a battery supply agreement with CATL.
In recent years, Tesla is producing its 4680 large cylindrical batteries at full capacity. The so-called 4680 large cylindrical battery, that is, a battery with a diameter of 46 mm and a height of 80 mm. According to data released by Tesla, compared with Tesla 2170 small cylindrical battery, 4680 has 5 times its energy capacity and increased cruising range by about 16%.
Since the beginning of this year, the news of Tesla's investment in the construction of a power battery factory has come out frequently. On January 14, Tesla announced that it will invest more than $3.6 billion to expand its Gigafactory in Nevada and will build two new factories, one of which is the 4680 Battery Factory, with a planned annual production capacity of 100GWh. If Tesla can solve the performance and process problems of the battery and achieve its planned production capacity, then the 4680 large cylindrical battery may become the key to Tesla's goal of "producing 20 million cars per year by 2030".
However, it was recently reported that Tesla is recruiting material suppliers from China and South Korea to help reduce the cost of its 4680 battery cells and increase its energy.
The market share of loading volume has increased rapidly
It is worth noting that the installed volume of BYD's power battery is increasing rapidly.
According to statistics released by South Korean research institute SNE Research, in January this year, the battery installed capacity of electric vehicles worldwide was 33 GWh, an increase of 18.1% year-on-year. BYD's battery installed capacity in the month was 5.8 GWh, a year-on-year increase of 78.8%, the fastest growth rate among the top ten companies on the list. Its market share was 17.6%, up 6 percentage points year-on-year, ranking second in the world.
Tesla's battery suppliers LG Energy Solution and Japan's Panasonic also grew. Among them, LG New Energy Energy's installed volume in January this year was 4.3 GWh, a growth rate of 51.3%, mainly due to the increase in Tesla Model 3 and Model Y sales. Panasonic's global installed capacity of batteries in Japan was 3.7 GWh, a significant increase of 45.3% year-on-year, and its market share increased to 11.2%.
In addition, in China, the gap between BYD and the Ningde era is also rapidly narrowing. In February this year, the installed capacity of power batteries CATL was 9.6GWh, and BYD was 7.5GWh, accounting for the top two. The market share of the two companies is 43.76% and 34.19% respectively, and the gap between BYD's market share and Ningde is getting smaller and smaller.
Editor-in-chief: Gu Wanquan Text editor: Song Hui Source of title picture: Xinhua News Agency Data map Photo editor: Xiang Jianying
Source: Author: China Fund News