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Juwan: a Chinese EV battery unicorn quietly invested by Tencent

On 8 April 2022, Tencent quietly invested in Guangzhou Juwan Technology Research Institute Co., Ltd(Juwan) with a valuation of RMB 8 billion. It is reported that this is the first time Tencent invested in a company upstream of the new energy vehicle industry chain.


Juwan focuses on the research and development, production, sales and service of super fast charging power batteries and a new generation of breakthrough energy storage systems and their systems.


At present, the "Super Fast Charge Lithium Battery" developed by Juwan that charges 80% in 5-8 minutes has been mass-produced in GAC Aeon models. XFC (eXtreme Fast Charge) has created the world of "the fastest electric vehicle charging technology" It is planning to build 1,000 supercharging stations in 100 key cities across the country.


Juwan currently has 12 published patent applications, of which 7 are invention patents. The company's patent layout is mainly related to graphene, vehicle power and other fields.

In terms of production capacity, Juwan's battery pack factory in Nansha, Guangzhou has been fully put into operation, and plans to build a R&D and production base in Guangzhou Huangpu Development Z


one to engage in the research and development of super fast charging cells, next-generation new energy storage devices and PACK integrated systems and produce.

According to Pei Feng, at present, Juwan has launched the construction of about 500 acres of battery cell production bases in Guangzhou. It is expected that the first phase of the project will be completed in 2023, with a production capacity of 8GWh, corresponding to the supply of 120,000 vehicles.


In addition, recently Juwan also announced that it will work with Tianshu Energy to jointly build 1,000 supercharging stations in 100 cities in China from 2022 to 2024, with a total investment of over 1 billion yuan. Specifically, in the first stage, Juwan will focus on Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and the Pearl River Delta region.


Nowadays, many car companies have penetrated into the power battery industry, such as Great Wall Motor Dayu Battery, and its own battery company Honeycomb Energy's self-developed cobalt-free laminated battery; SAIC Zhiji's silicon-doped lithium battery; BYD blade battery; Dongfeng Lantu "three no batteries"; BMW also bet on hydrogen fuel cells and solid-state batteries and so on.


Unlike other manufacturers, Juwan mainly develops graphene batteries.


In 2019, GAC Group released a "super fast charging battery" based on three-dimensional structure graphene (3DG) material. According to GAC Group, the "super fast charging battery" can charge the battery to 85% in 8 minutes. In May 2020, GAC New Energy announced that its model Aion will be the first to be equipped with graphene batteries and undergo mass production testing.


At that time, Ouyang Minggao

, an expert in automotive power systems and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said bluntly, "If someone tells you that this car can run 1,000 kilometers, it can be fully charged in a few minutes, and it is very safe and the cost is very low. Then everyone Don't believe it, because it's impossible right now, there hasn't been a big breakthrough in this regard in recent years."


At the same time, the market also believes that there are still certain uncertainties in the reliability and safety of graphene batteries.


At present, the 3DG graphene of Juwan is mainly used in super fast charging. In the future, this technology will be widely used in electric vehicles, 3C, energy storage systems, super fast charging stations, engineering services, etc.


"Juwan focuses on solving the problems of slow charging and difficult charging, which are the most contradictory in the current market application." Huang Xiangdong said.


It can be seen that the construction and layout of cell and battery pack production capacity is only the first step of Juwan. Problems such as "difficult and slow charging" in the new energy vehicle industry.


It is reported that the positioning of Juwan is not as simple as the technology and product suppliers behind GAC Aeon. Their goal is to export technology and products to the whole industry and become a high-tech company in the field of electrification and intelligence.


Pei Feng said that the Juwan team is currently in contact with other OEMs, and battery products have been introduced by other OEMs other than GAC. Juwan's super fast-charging battery has the feature of compatibility with the charging interface. Compared with the existing ordinary power charging equipment on the market, it has the feature of maximizing the use of the power of the charging pile.


Super fast charging technology is regarded as a key technology to lead the transformation of the automotive industry in the future.


After the mass production is realized, Juwan will gradually develop its applications in the fields of super fast rechargeable batteries, super capacitors, lightweight body, fuel cells and other fields according to the maturity of technology and market. When the conditions are ripe, the company's business will also expand to The upstream and downstream extension of the new energy industry chain. The recently raised Series A financing will also be used for capacity construction, research and development of second-generation technologies, and to supplement daily working capital.



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