CATL to drive electrification with faster-charging, higher-performing batteries

Contemporary Amperex Technology Limited (CATL), the world’s largest electric vehicle (EV) battery producer, has unveiled its upgraded technologies – including lighter battery packs and faster charging mode – which are expected to accelerate the global automotive industry’s electrification drive. The company, which holds more than a 40 per cent share of the global market, aimed to set a healthy tone for the Chinese EV sector to implement its go-global strategy, focusing on constant technological advancements rather than an endless cycle of price competition, according to founder and chairman Robin Zeng Yuqun. “For Chinese EV technologies [to] expand abroad, we should chase, not only the speed and scale, but the quality of innovation, the ability to validate and the credibility of the brands,” he said at the company’s Super Technology Day event in Beijing on Tuesday. “A rigorous attitude towards scientific research is our most important commitment today.” At the event, CATL announced that its third-generation Shenxing battery took six minutes and 27 seconds to charge, down from 10 per cent to 98 per cent. The charging speed beats BYD’s second-generation Blade battery which takes nine minutes to charge from 10 per cent to 90 per cent. CATL claimed that it was the fastest EV charging technology in the world. BYD, the world’s largest EV assembler, also produces battery packs. Its global market share stood at 13.4 per cent in the first two months of 2026, trailing only CATL, according to Seoul-based SNE Research. In practice, faster charging battery technology further eases drivers’ range anxiety since it reduces the time they need to spend at charging stations. CATL also announced its newly designed Qilin battery pack, weighing 625kg, could offer a car as much as 1,000km driving range. Before, a pack capable of driving a car for 1,000km on a single charge would be 255kg heavier because it used more battery cells, Gao Huan, chief technology officer of CATL, said. At Tuesday’s event CATL added that its sodium-ion batteries, an alternative to lithium-ion batteries, would be mass-produced and delivered in the fourth quarter of this year to power some of the electric cars built by state-owned Changan Automobile. Sodium-ion technology uses a more widely available raw material and the batteries are cheaper to produce. CATL, based in Ningde, east China’s Fujian province, reported a net profit of 20.74 billion yuan (US$3.04 billion) in the three months to March, up 48.5 per cent year on year. The figure beat a Bloomberg consensus estimate of 17.6 billion yuan. It also planned to earmark 30 billion yuan to establish a subsidiary to manage and expand mining assets, after the global energy shock paved the way for a quicker entry into the world’s automotive and energy storage system markets, CATL said in a filing to the Shenzhen Stock Exchange. Chinese assemblers and automotive supply-chain vendors currently stand at the vanguard of EV technology and production, buoyed by government support and consumers’ willingness to embrace innovation, according to analysts. Over the past few years, they slashed prices of their products when vying for a bigger market share outside mainland China despite their superiority to overseas peers. Beijing stepped in last year to stop vicious price competition among EV makers, warning of penalties for firms that spearheaded discount wars. Carmakers are now taking one of two paths: upgrading production techniques to reduce manufacturing costs and make their prices more attractive, or offering consumers new models that outperform existing ones at the same price, according to Nick Lai, head of auto research for Asia-Pacific at JPMorgan.