CATL executive warns of risks from EV price cuts, calls on Beijing to intervene
A senior executive from
Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL) , the world's largest producer of batteries for electric vehicles (EVs), urged authorities on the mainland to intervene in the price war that is roiling the market for new energy cars.
Ni Jun, CATL's chief manufacturing officer, on Wednesday said the
brutal discount war would not end if Beijing remained on the sidelines.
'One big player cannot always lower prices [to gain market share] while driving out all other small rivals,' he said at the World Economic Forum in Tianjin. 'If it continues to do so without proper [regulatory] oversight, all of its rivals will not survive.'
Ni did not name the 'big player', but BYD – the world's largest EV builder – kicked off a fresh round of price cuts in May. The EV giant offered discounts of 10 per cent to more than 30 per cent on 22 of its battery-powered and plug-in hybrid models, which prompted other firms to slash prices on 70 models in May, according to the mainland business publication 21st Century Business Herald.
CATL, which for the first four months of 2025 had a 38.6 per cent share of the global EV battery market, raised US$5.22 billion in its Hong Kong share listing last month, the world's largest initial public offering this year.
Ni's remarks at the forum were the latest warning from an influential industry player about the prospects for the mainland's EV sector, which despite its troubles was considered to be at the global vanguard for electric cars.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
South China Morning Post
36 minutes ago
- South China Morning Post
China is taking Silicon Valley's market ‘hacks' to a whole new level
What are the origins of China's leverage in the trade war? And why are China's exports disrupting markets across the world? That China has a strong hand is largely because it has picked up lessons from Silicon Valley and deployed the tactics at every level of the supply chain. Just as Silicon Valley companies 'hacked' markets by upending traditional notions of best business practices and industry dynamics, many Chinese companies are doing the same with the global economy – and transforming policymakers' understanding of scale. The Silicon Valley paradigm includes four key dynamics. First, companies focus on 'blitzscaling' – growing as fast as possible, even at the expense of profit. Social media platforms, ride-sharing companies, artificial intelligence (AI) developers and others burned through billions in start-up capital to establish markets of scale long before they made a penny in profit. Once scale was achieved, other market actors had no choice but to build atop or in relation to these new platforms and infrastructures. Second, with penetration pricing , companies offered free or low-priced products to create a large market and/or network. Why pay for news, for instance, when you can browse Facebook, Reddit or TikTok for free? Once everyone is on one or two social media platforms, media companies and advertisers have no choice but to operate within that network. Ride-sharing companies like Uber and Lyft offered impractically cheap prices for years. Every major model developer offers at least one free version. These companies ignored the laws of supply and demand for a time so as to emerge as practically the only supplier for a market. Third, Silicon Valley's business environment gave rise to massive network effects: the winners became super rich and powerful, able to influence the economies and politics of entire countries, while the 'losers' were bought up or otherwise faded away.
South China Morning Post
4 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
China-tied AI tools like DeepSeek face US federal ban over ‘threat' to national security
A bipartisan group of US lawmakers introduced a bill in both chambers of Congress to ban the federal use of China-linked artificial intelligence tools such as DeepSeek , writing the latest chapter in the tech rivalry between the world's top AI powers. Titled the 'No Adversarial AI Act', the proposed legislation aims to prohibit federal agencies from procuring or deploying AI technologies developed in China, Russia Iran and North Korea The bill was introduced in the House by US congressman John Moolenaar, a Michigan Republican who chairs the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party , and Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, the panel's senior Democrat. Rick Scott, a Florida Republican, and Gary Peters, a Michigan Democrat, introduced the companion legislation in the Senate. US congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi, an Illinois Democrat, is the ranking member of the special House committee focused on China. Photo: AP 'Artificial intelligence controlled by foreign adversaries poses a direct threat to our national security, our data and our government operations,' Krishnamoorthi said in a statement.
South China Morning Post
5 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
At ‘Summer Davos', Li Qiang vows China will be ‘mega-sized' consumption power
Premier Li Qiang has pledged that China will become a 'consumption powerhouse' capable of fuelling domestic and global growth, even as he acknowledged the country was grappling with a slump in cross-border investment and persistent trade tensions. Speaking at the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Tianjin on Wednesday, Li reiterated Beijing's commitment to boosting demand in the world's second-largest economy and defending globalisation. 'This will make China a mega-sized consumption powerhouse, on top of being a manufacturing powerhouse,' Li said at the gathering, also known as Summer Davos. 'We are on track to become a high-income country supported by robust consumption upgrades,' he added. Beijing's pivot towards stimulating household spending has gained urgency amid a volatile trade war with the United States and rising global uncertainty. Consumer activity picked up in May, helping offset pressure on manufacturing and exports in a challenging tariff environment. Retail sales rose by 6.4 per cent year on year, compared to 5.1 per cent in April.
