Rebirth 99 to become a car giant

No one knows the importance of batteries better than Cao Yang.

Although the real arrival of electrification will take more than ten years.

However, some technology accumulation cannot wait until the arrival of electrification.

Otherwise, it will definitely be in a hurry and unable to keep up with the development of the times.

Even if Dai Hanbiao doesn't mention battery development today, he is ready to talk about it.

Chips and batteries, in 2006, are not a very urgent matter.

But it is definitely the core part that is related to how far Nanshan Group can go in the future.

"Regarding the development of batteries, it is indeed very necessary."

"It is not only necessary to develop the FHEV battery used on Star III, but also to simultaneously review the development of batteries used in BEV models and PHEV models."

"And not only the development of ternary lithium batteries must be considered, but the development of lithium iron phosphate batteries must also be carried out simultaneously."

"Of course, the development of batteries involves various items such as batteries, modules, and BMS, which require a lot of resources."

"According to the current experimental equipment and personnel of Nanshan Auto Parts, it must not meet the requirements."

"So I plan to spin off the battery business separately and set up Nanshan Battery to be responsible for all businesses related to the battery business."

Cao Yang's statement made the high-level people present quite surprised, and they took it for granted.

So far, only two large parts, Nanshan engine and Nanshan gearbox, have been specially stripped from Nanshan auto parts.

There is also half of the chip-related semiconductor business unit, which can be regarded as being spun off.

For electric vehicles, the battery is no less important than the engine.

Although it is not known when the company will launch electric vehicles, it seems reasonable to separate the battery business separately.

"Mr. Cao, if Nanshan Battery can be established to research and produce new batteries, that would be the best."

"However, various companies now involve a wide variety of battery technologies, and we have simply collected and sorted them out before."

"Take the relatively mature FHEV battery technology as an example. Toyota uses nickel metal hydride batteries, and Honda uses ternary lithium batteries."

"In theory, ternary lithium batteries are definitely more advanced than nickel-metal hydride batteries."

"But the technology of nickel-hydrogen batteries is more mature, and the cost is lower in theory."

"Should we also consider following Toyota's footsteps on FHEV batteries?"

Although the battery business will be divested from Nanshan Auto Parts, Dai Hanbiao explained the previous investigation very responsibly.

In this era, there are still many doubts about the development direction of automotive battery technology.

Although many car companies are already researching and even launching electric vehicles, everyone has no idea.

In 1832, Scottish scientist Robert Anderson invented the first electric car prototype.

In 1859, the French scientist Gaston Plantar invented the first electric car.

In 1891, American inventor William Morris invented the first commercial electric car.

In 1900, the market share of electric vehicles in the United States reached 38%, but with the development of the internal combustion engine, the market share of electric vehicles gradually declined.

It can be said that electric vehicles are nothing new, they were even popular at one time.

In recent decades, electric vehicles have not been silent at all.

The Tama pure electric car released by Nissan in 1947 is equipped with a replaceable lead-acid battery, with a top speed of 35.2 kilometers per hour and a cruising range of 96.3 kilometers. It is mainly used by taxi companies.

In 1996, Nissan developed the world's first lithium-ion battery-powered Prairie Joy.

Also in 1996, General Motors launched the EV1, the first modern electric car.

Various other car companies have also launched or are researching some electric vehicles.

No one has much doubt that electric vehicles represent the future.

It's just that no one knows whether this future will come in ten years, twenty years, or thirty years.

No, no one knows except Cao Yang.

Therefore, Cao Yang was not surprised at Dai Hanbiao's explanation.

Following the footsteps of the successful ones and launching better products after following the research, this is something that is more in line with the law of business development.

However, this approach is definitely unnecessary for Cao Yang.

There are shortcuts to take, why take detours?

Although nickel-metal hydride batteries are used as FHEV batteries, Toyota has not completely abandoned them even by 2023.

But that doesn't mean it's a good choice.

For pure electric vehicles, there are only two mainstream routes in the future.

Ternary lithium battery and lithium iron phosphate battery.

Other technical routes are all soy sauce.

Therefore, if Nanshan Battery wants to invest a lot of manpower and material resources in battery research, it must focus on batteries with these two chemical components.

"Now the batteries used in all walks of life are beginning to develop in the direction of lithium batteries."

"With the expansion of industrialization, some problems encountered in the production and use of lithium batteries will definitely be solved slowly."

"If our Nanshan Battery wants to keep up with the pace of battery research, we must study the most advanced and promising technologies in the industry."

"Of course, I also know that there are not many people in the company who understand battery development, and they need to recruit a group from outside."

"However, compared with other auto parts, in the field of batteries, some domestic universities have made some achievements."

"We can directly invite teachers from some universities to join our company, or engage in cooperative research and development with some professors."

"At the same time, it is also possible to dig some domestic and foreign talents for lithium batteries to come back."

"As far as I know, most of the lithium batteries of Nokia and Motorola are purchased from BYD and ATL in Guancheng."

"BYD and we have a cooperative relationship now, which is not suitable for large-scale poaching."

"But for ATL, everyone can still work hard."

"In addition, some companies in Dongying also did research on lithium batteries relatively early."

"There must be a lot of Chinese in it who are engaged in related research, and we can find a way to poach them here."

The current salary of Nanshan Group has been rising, especially for core talents, in fact, it is no worse than that of foreign countries.

So at this time, if he goes abroad to recruit people, Cao Yang must have a lot more confidence.

There are so many battery companies in China in later generations, which fully demonstrates that the training of battery-related talents is not as difficult as everyone imagined.

"Compared with the recruitment of chip talents, the recruitment of lithium battery talents should be much easier."

Liu Youmei also stood up in time to express her opinion.

When she was in Warwick Company, she happened to have come into contact with talents in this field.

After all, whether it is a base station or some other products, batteries are needed.

Even if it does not produce batteries by itself, it still needs some talents who understand battery design.

"The industrialization of lithium batteries originated in Japan, specifically from Sony's production of 18650 cylindrical batteries in 1991."

"In the early days of industrial development, the lithium battery market was almost controlled by a few Japanese companies such as Panasonic, Sanyo Electric, and Toshiba."

"These companies have established deep barriers in terms of materials and battery technology, and closely cooperate with upstream and downstream companies in the industrial chain, and their production is already highly automated."

"Before 2000, Japan's lithium battery companies accounted for more than 95% of the global market share."

"The domestic lithium battery industry started with BYD. In 1998, BYD entered the mobile phone lithium battery market. With the domestic low labor force and the cost advantage formed after technological transformation, BYD's battery price can be 40% lower than Dongying Sanyo on average."

"As a result, BYD's production capacity and market share have rapidly expanded, and it has successively supplied to mainstream mobile phone manufacturers such as Motorola and Nokia."

"Last year, Toshiba couldn't resist the price war of Chinese lithium battery companies and directly announced its withdrawal from the lithium battery market."

"When we go to Dongpu to recruit people at this time, the difficulty is definitely the lowest."

"Whether it is the original lithium battery researchers in Toshiba, or the talents in Sony, Panasonic and Sanyo Electric, they all have the opportunity to serve us."

When Liu Youmei said this, Cao Yang couldn't help but nodded.

Now is indeed a good time to enter the lithium battery industry.

Although it seems like a low period for the development of international lithium batteries, the lower the valley, the easier it is to recruit people.

"When we poach people, we not only poach people who research battery technology, but also people who research battery equipment."

"I hope that Nanshan equipment can achieve 100% localization of battery equipment in the future."

Cao Yang knows the importance of equipment better than anyone else.

BYD's lithium batteries are not very automated now.

For products used in consumer electronics, the impact is not that great.

But it's definitely not enough to use it in a car.

With so many batteries used in an electric vehicle, if the performance of each battery is inconsistent, the impact on the entire battery pack will be huge.

It can even be said to be fatal.

To maintain the consistency of battery performance, in addition to working hard on research and development, it is also very important to automate the production process.

"Mr. Cao, in order to cooperate with the development of Nanshan Battery, Nanshan Equipment will set up a research team for battery production and production."

"In the future, there will definitely be more and more domestic companies engaged in battery production. At that time, we can not only provide equipment for our own battery factory, but also consider selling it to the outside world."

Pan Jinxing also stood up in time to express his opinion.

"At this stage, the domestic lithium battery production mode mainly combines low-cost manpower with automation equipment. Lithium battery manufacturers usually only use a single automation equipment for a few precise processes, and other links with lower precision requirements and intermediate material transportation are required. It's manual."

"Compared with Dongying's fully automated production line, the investment cost of this human-based production line is very low, and the flexible production capacity is also very strong."

"The success of this production model lies in the fact that China's labor prices are very low. The average wage level of manufacturing employees in my country is only about 1/22 of that in Japan."

"Even our small battery production line for button batteries belongs to this kind of production line."

It is not that Nanshan Auto Parts has no experience in battery production.

In the previous cooperation with BYD, there was a small production line corresponding to the button battery used in the smart key of the car.

However, this production line obviously has nothing to do with advanced technology.

So when it comes to battery equipment, Dai Hanbiao also stood up and added the situation.

"This labor-intensive development method cannot last forever. I heard that Sanyo Electric is planning to build new production bases in Imperial Capital and Jincheng, and Panasonic and Sony are also planning to invest in domestic factories in order to weaken the cost advantage of domestic manufacturers. "

"Besides, the high-performance lithium batteries that will be used in electric vehicles in the future will definitely not be able to be fully automatic."

"Not to mention that the battery production equipment used by Dongying and Korea is very expensive. From the perspective of restricting the development of competitors, the equipment they sell to domestic manufacturers will definitely not be the most advanced, but the outdated equipment that will be eliminated. come over."

"So it is inevitable to research related equipment in China."

"Of course, we don't have to produce 100% of all equipment in the company. Some equipment with relatively low technical content, which can be bought anywhere in China, can be purchased directly from outside."

"There are also some relatively professional manufacturers, and there are similar manufacturers in China, and we can also cooperate with them for development."

"As long as the equipment for our production line can be purchased domestically, that's enough."

"We mainly study some core equipment ourselves."

Cao Yang did not put so much pressure on Nanshan Equipment.

The battery production line is very long. From the very beginning of mixing and stirring, the whole production line involves all kinds of equipment.

It takes a lot of manpower and material resources to handle all the Nanshan equipment by ourselves, so there is no need for this.

"Mr. Cao, we will conduct a thorough investigation internally to see which equipment is researched by ourselves and which equipment is purchased from outside."

After listening to Cao Yang's words, Pan Jinxing stood up in time to express his opinion.

Today's Nanshan equipment has great strength in all aspects.

He wasn't particularly worried about losing the chain.

"Research and development related to battery equipment and semiconductors is a field with great potential in the future."

"Although for our company, the accumulation in this area is relatively small, but we still have time."

"It is basically enough to complete the research and development and production of some equipment step by step in the early stage, and to fully catch up with the international advanced level in the next five years."

"Of course, if the progress can be improved, it would be great."

Cao Yang didn't put too much pressure on everyone.

Although he can also do it himself to speed up the progress.

In fact, he will definitely give a push as well.

But it is certainly not necessary to participate in the research and development of all equipment, and there is no time for that.

Next, Cao Yang put forward some requirements for some other key parts and branches. The business of each section of Nanshan Group immediately began to work towards the goal of 2006.