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This battery pioneer is worth $40 billion, but he's no ‘rich guy'
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Rory Jones , Yang Jie , The Wall Street Journal CATL founder Robin Zeng represents a new type of tycoon flourishing in Xi Jinping's China. Robin Zeng, founder and chairman of CATL, in Shanghai in April. Gift this article
With an estimated net worth of nearly $40 billion, Robin Zeng could definitely afford to buy a superyacht. The thing is, he doesn't want to.
With an estimated net worth of nearly $40 billion, Robin Zeng could definitely afford to buy a superyacht. The thing is, he doesn't want to.
The founder of the world's largest battery maker represents a new type of tycoon flourishing in Xi Jinping's China: He's understated, philanthropic and ready to echo official state talking points.
'People told me: 'Why don't you enjoy your life? You can buy a yacht,'" Zeng said on a video podcast hosted by Norway's sovereign-wealth fund, ahead of the Hong Kong listing in May of his company, CATL. 'I don't want to be the rich guy," Zeng said. 'I want to share these riches," he added, 'to try to create a good society."
The listing raised $5.3 billion, making it the largest public offering in the world this year. CATL, known officially as Contemporary Amperex Technology, capitalized on rising demand from electric-vehicle makers like Tesla. Its batteries were installed in one out of every three EVs globally last year.
Zeng emerged during a turbulent period in China when policymaking slowed the country's once-rapid growth but allowed a new set of magnates to get rich.
Over the past decade, Xi has reined in the country's once freewheeling finance sector, curbed rampant property speculation and checked the power of tech executives such as Alibaba's Jack Ma. The Communist leader has also restructured the economy according to his own vision, focusing money and resources on industries that can buttress China against a hostile America.
Zeng, 57 years old, has leveraged his tech know-how and the state's willingness to throw money at the renewable energy and electric-vehicle industries. Wang Chuanfu, the founder of carmaker BYD, and Lei Jun of Xiaomi, an electronics and EV maker, also profited from the government's focus on high-tech manufacturing.
These billionaires are publicly aligned with Xi's vision for China, where ostentatious displays of wealth aren't tolerated and humility is the sentiment of the day. Zeng, Wang and Lei all took prominent seats when the leader summoned top executives in February for a pep talk.
'They've all learned that they have made it within the great scheme" and 'don't go around saying, 'This was all me,'" said Rupert Hoogewerf, founder of the Hurun China Rich List, an annual ranking.
Zeng declined to be interviewed. ''Refining yourself and enabling others' lies at the heart of CATL's values," the company said in a statement. CATL aims to empower 'communities, our hometown, regions across China, and ultimately, people around the world."
Zeng, whose Chinese name is Zeng Yuqun, grew up in China's southeastern province of Fujian, near Ningde, where CATL is now based. His parents farmed a plot of land that barely fed the family, according to local media reports.
He later studied naval architecture at Shanghai's Jiao Tong University, graduating in 1989. The Communist Party at the time assigned some jobs, and Zeng was tasked with working at a state-owned factory in Fujian. After a couple of months, he moved to work for an electronics manufacturer in the southern boomtown of Dongguan and obtained a Ph.D. in physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Several years after he co-founded a lithium-ion battery company called Amperex Technology Ltd., Zeng began talks with Apple about creating a battery to fit the sleek iPod. Zeng became a supplier for the pioneering audio player, and ATL parlayed it into bigger jobs making batteries for iPhones and iPads.
Zeng sold ATL to Japanese electronics manufacturer TDK in 2005 for $100 million but stuck around, setting up a division focused on car batteries. When Chinese regulators prohibited the division from supplying the Chinese market because it was owned by a foreign company, Zeng started the Chinese-owned company, CATL, in 2011.
The timing was perfect. The government had begun prioritizing the development of electric vehicles, offering subsidies to manufacturers.
Zeng celebrates at CATL's listing ceremony at the Hong Kong stock exchange in May.
As with ATL, Zeng built the company's early reputation around a contract with a blue-chip Western brand, supplying EV batteries to a BMW joint venture in China. His big boost came in 2015 when Beijing told global automakers they would only qualify for subsidies if they used batteries from a list of approved Chinese suppliers, including CATL.
In 2014, CATL's revenue was $1.2 billion. A year later, it jumped to $9 billion.
Zeng amassed a $5.8 billion fortune following CATL's first listing in 2018, on the Shenzhen stock exchange. He has a nearly one-quarter stake in the company, which has a market value of more than $160 billion.
By 2020, CATL began supplying Elon Musk's Tesla factory in China, cementing its position as the market leader.
With customers around the world, Zeng regularly works until around midnight, he told the Norwegian podcast 'In Good Company." The always-on schedule means he likes a nap around 1 p.m. to recharge, Zeng said. He has given some of his wealth to a children's charity, he added, and placed factories in rural China to ensure workers can live close to their families.
He is driven by the values of Confucius, the ancient Chinese sage, Zeng has said in other interviews. He encourages people to read the philosopher's book of sayings, known in English as 'The Analects," which emphasize lifelong learning and continuous moral improvement.
Earlier in his career, Zeng was photographed with the words written in calligraphy, 'Strong Gambling Nature," illustrating his willingness to make big bets. He more recently has been pictured in his office alongside a phrase from a Confucius classic: 'Profound and Extensive Like a Deep Spring," describing the wisdom of a sage.
China's billionaire class took off after changes in the 1990s spurred private-sector entrepreneurship. Not all stayed on the right side of the Communist Party.
One of the first private-sector billionaires, Huang Guangyu, was convicted of corruption in 2010 and spent more than a decade in prison. At least three other former holders of the title of China's richest man had serious run-ins with Chinese leadership, said Hoogewerf.
Zeng's customers have acknowledged his power over the EV battery industry.
'We all have to make money for him," Li Bin, the founder of NIO, a Chinese EV startup, said at a Beijing auto show last year. Li's firm, like many Chinese EV makers, is losing money, while CATL made $7 billion in profit last year. Zeng replied, 'We're just making bricks."
Zeng has begun positioning his company as more than just a battery maker for cars. He wants batteries in trucks, trains and aircraft, and believes entire cities and countries can be powered with renewable energy backed by battery storage.
The Chinese EV market faces a price war and oversupply. U.S. scrutiny of CATL is intensifying amid national-security concerns, with the Pentagon alleging military ties and lawmakers subpoenaing U.S. banks over CATL's Hong Kong listing. CATL said it isn't involved in any military-related business, and the banks said they are cooperating.
The issues haven't lessened investor appetite. CATL's share price in Hong Kong is up more 50% since the listing, outpacing its shares in mainland China, a market viewed as less accessible to global investors.
But entrepreneurs like Zeng remain at the whim of Xi, according to Desmond Shum, who wrote a book about getting rich via connections with Communist Party officials.
'If you don't understand this, you'll be the first one to be slaughtered," he said in an interview. Topics You May Be Interested In Catch all the Business News , Corporate news , Breaking News Events and Latest News Updates on Live Mint. Download The Mint News App to get Daily Market Updates.
