When it comes to new energy vehicles in China, Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. is an unavoidable topic.
This company is like a stone monkey. In just a few years, from a newly established company, it has achieved the first global market share. Many people have heard about Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd. for the first time, and its market value has reached hundreds of billions.
199 1 year, Sony released the first commercial 18650 ternary lithium-ion battery. Tesla delivered its first sports car in 2008, using Panasonic's NCA cylindrical ternary lithium battery. Up to now, high-density NCA cylindrical batteries can't be mass-produced in China, which shows that Japanese technology is leading.
South Korea's Samsung SDI, LG and SKI have strong advantages in technology and capital.
Even BYD in China should not be underestimated. Otherwise, how could it win the side of Warren Buffett?
How did Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. create this miracle under the eyes of the giants? What is its core competitiveness? Can the number one position in the world be stable? What challenges do you need to face? Does Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. have anything to do with Japan?
Niu Dun will combine three articles, starting with his life experience.
1)ATL new energy science and technology
Established in 1980, SAE is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Japan TDK Group, a new material company with several factories in Dongguan, mainly producing hard disks, magnetic heads and digital video recorders. Products are supplied to international digital giants such as Samsung, Toshiba, Fujitsu, Hitachi and Western Digital. Many national leaders of China and two special capitals of Hong Kong have visited, which shows the technical strength and industry status of the new department.
Zeng Yuquan, Liang Shaokang and Chen are all senior managers of the new department.
1999 Zeng, Liang and Chen resigned to start a business and set up a company called Amperex Technology Limited in Hong Kong, referred to as ATL. ATL's first factory settled in Dongguan-Dongguan New Energy Electronic Technology Co., Ltd.
Zeng Yuquan, who was full of blood, flew to the United States with hot money and bought the patent authorization of polymer lithium-ion battery from Bell Laboratories. Previously, Bell had awarded this patent to more than 20 companies. However, after testing by the research team, it is found that this lithium polymer has a fatal defect-it is easy to expand and deform after repeated charging, and the product may explode. Consulting Bell Labs, the other party said that this was determined by the product characteristics-it could not be solved.
At this point, there is only a small amount of $2.5 million in venture capital, but the product cannot be mass-produced. There is only one choice before them-to solve this difficult problem.
Zeng Yuquan is the director of research and development in SAE, and ATL is the technology entrepreneurship team. After repeated attempts, the problem lies in the composition of electrolyte. The upper temperature limit of lithium battery is 85℃, and the boiling point of some components in the electrolyte of Bell Laboratories is 93℃, which is very close to the upper temperature limit of lithium battery. By improving the electrolyte formula, the low-boiling chemicals were eliminated. After two weeks, the batteries made according to two new formulas actually stopped expanding. ATL is the first and only company that has successfully industrialized this technology among more than 20 companies that have purchased Bell Labs licenses.
Before ATL mass production, lithium-ion batteries were cylindrical and square hard-shell batteries represented by Japan and South Korea, which were difficult to be lightweight and customized. Soft-packed lithium polymer can easily achieve these two points, and is suitable for all kinds of miniaturized electronic products. This differentiated competitive strategy contributed to the success of ATL in the future.
The next story is a story of diaosi's counterattack. 200 1 year, ATL shipped 1 10,000 batteries.
In 2004, an American consumer electronics company came to the door. They also looked for other lithium battery companies, but they either had no flexibility or could not solve the problem of battery expansion. ATL solved the problem that the cycle life of lithium battery was too short at that time and successfully entered this enterprise. ATL didn't expect this company to be so big. The first time I supplied an MP3 player, I earned more than 654.38+08 million in one breath.
This company is called Apple.
Of course, ATL became an iPhone supplier in 2007, and orders flew like snowflakes, and a single spark had already started a prairie fire.
ATL's customer list is getting longer and longer, including Samsung, Huawei, VIVO, DJI and so on. Zhang Yujie, director of ATL, said in an interview that "almost all digital brands in the world have adopted ATL products". From 2065438+02 to 2065438+06, ATL ranked first in the world in polymer battery shipments for five consecutive years.
20 16 despite China's opposition, the south Korean government insisted on deploying sade at the star state base in south Korea. Also on 20 16, more than one month after the release of Samsung Galaxy Note7 mobile phone, more than 30 battery explosions and fire accidents occurred. Samsung confirmed that none of them had anything to do with ATL, which made it famous in the industry.
Everything has only one side. These two unrelated things finally gave a gift to the lithium battery industry in China, which will be discussed later.
The story of Das Kapital appeared in BLACKPINK, when business was booming and expansion was imminent.
1999 ATL conducted a round of financing, and the venture capital institution was in Handing Asia Pacific; In the second round of financing in 2003, the gold owners were Carlyle Investment in the United States and 3i Group in the United Kingdom. In 2004, Carlyle chased round C.
Around 2004, a director of Carlyle ATL visited BIC battery, and was disappointed to find that the cost of BIC battery was lower than that of Amperex Technology Limited. So ... In 2005, the three major shareholders proposed to withdraw funds, and ATL had to find new investors. Finally, the old club of the three entrepreneurs, Japan TDK Group, acquired the 1 00% equity of ATL for1100 million dollars.
As a result, ATL changed from 100% Japanese enterprise to 100% Japanese enterprise.
Why ATL management also sold its own equity to TDK is puzzling. The three founders left their jobs to start businesses and finally made a profit, becoming the core suppliers of Apple. When their business was booming, they sold all their shares to their former boss. Are they addicted to work or have something else to hide? Are there any other deals between them? Is a mystery.
Let Niu Dun guess, maybe the three founders have different opinions on the controlling stake, and simply sell it to resolve their differences.
Stock right replacement has laid the groundwork for Zeng Yuqun to create new miracles.
2)CATL Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd.
In 2008, China government began to support the new energy automobile industry, and ATL management smelled the opportunity and decided to set up the power battery department. At that time, due to legal restrictions, wholly foreign-owned enterprises could not produce power batteries. Zeng Yuqun advocated the independence of R&D system, but there were different opinions within ATL.
20 1 1, Contemporary Ampere Technology Limited New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. (CATL) was established by Zeng Yuqun and Huang Shilin (then vice president of ATL R&D, responsible for the research and development of vehicle power batteries and management systems). ATL's parent company, Japanese TDK, once held a short-term stake in Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. 15%, and then transferred it to another China company, Ningbo Lianchuang, on 20 15.
It is puzzling that ATL's founding team sold 100% equity to Japan's TDK, and it is unreasonable for Japan's TDK to sell 15% equity of Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd. on 20 15.
What's the story? Another mystery.
At this point, Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. (CATL) has become a 100% China company, while ATL is a 100% Japanese company.
The two companies are completely independent in law, headquartered in Ningde, Fujian, with management from China, and are inextricably linked in business. I believe that the two companies will have new stories in the future.
In 20 12, BMW Brilliance sought a battery supplier for its new energy vehicle "Zino 1E" which will be released the following year. Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd. with ATL technical background attracted BMW's attention, and BMW provided a German production standard of more than 700 pages, which made contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd. hesitate at that time and worried that it was too complicated. After eating more than 700 pages of German technical requirements documents of BMW and meeting all of them, Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. became the core supplier of BMW. In order to help Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. produce the battery that BMW wants, a senior engineer of BMW stayed in Ningde for more than two years. Although Zino 1E failed in the end, the cooperation with BMW improved the technical level of contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd.
With the support of BMW, Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. has gained a firm foothold in the Jianghu. Under the banner of "BMW battery supplier", the customer list of Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. has quickly increased BAIC New Energy, Geely, Changan, Great Wall, SAIC and Yutong.
The significance of this cooperation to Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. will be repeatedly mentioned by Contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. in the future.
In the following years, with the strong support of the government, China's new energy automobile industry grew explosively. With its excellent battery performance and stable quality control, Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd. gained 465,438+0% market share in China from a new company in 2065,438+08, and BYD, the second-ranked company, had only 20% market share.
It took only seven years to achieve these achievements. The figure of a lithium battery overlord is becoming more and more clear.
Is the success of contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd. accidental or inevitable?
Why haven't these seven years been besieged by battery giants in Japan and South Korea?
What factors have played a vital role in the success of contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd.?
Can the successful genes in the past continue?
Please wait for the next article. ...