Geely, one of China’s top four-passenger car manufacturers and parent company to Volvo, is joining forces with Chinese NIO to co-develop swappable battery standards. That was unveiled by the two partners just a week after NIO signed a similar deal with another giant, Changan Automobile.

In China, battery swapping is quite hot compared to the rest of the world as an alternative for fast charging, as it only takes three minutes for an NIO to swap an empty battery for a 100% charged one. China predicts sales of electric vehicles, so-called NEVs, will reach 7,8 million units in 2025, of which battery-swap models are expected to account for 30%. That might trigger a global movement in the future.

28 swapping stations in Europe

NIO already has over 2 100 fully automated battery swapping stations operational in China since it started in 2019, next to an extensive fast-charging network. And it just opened its 28th swapping station in Europe, in Germany. On the other hand, Geely Holding’s battery swap station operator, Yiyi Power, has 300 of its own swapping stations operational.

In the partnership agreement on battery swapping signed two days ago in Hangzhou, both parties agreed “to carry out comprehensive cooperation on battery standards, battery swapping technology, battery swapping network expansion and operation, swappable model development, and battery asset management”.

Open to other brands

William Li, NIO’s founder, chairman, and CEO, said earlier that the company’s battery swap stations network is open to other brands and compared the service to a cloud service. But to be able to swap batteries, different brands must comply with NIO’s standards.

In other words, they would need to design vehicle chassis based on the specifications of NIO’s battery packs, and that’s not what the competition likes to do. So, by joining forces in developing two common standards for battery packs and constructing a battery-swapping network for multi-brand sharing, the future will be less dependent on NIO technology.

Geely’s tentacles worldwide

Geely is one of China’s largest car companies, with well-known brands including Geely Auto, Zeekr, Lynk & Co, and Livan, and controlling European brands like Volvo, Polestar, and Lotus. It’s also one of Mercedes-Benz’s largest shareholders, with nearly 10%, and co-owns the new Smart EV brand. For instance, the Smart #1, Zeekr X, and Volvo EX30 basically have the same technical underpinnings.

In China, Geely sold some 1,113 million cars in the first ten months of this year, according to figures from the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA). It comes in fourth after Chongqing Changan Automobile (1,130 million cars). The two most prominent were BYD (2,142 million) and FAW (1,466 million).

FAW Group’s high-end EV brand Hongqi is rumoured to be one of the first of the group to embrace NIO’s swapping technology, but that’s not confirmed. BYD, which builds electric forklifts, buses, trains, and passenger cars, is China’s second biggest battery maker after CATL. It supplies its Blade Batteries to NIO, among others. BYD’s Fudi Battery daughter is also active in battery swapping.

Battery-as-a-Service

Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL) is, with a share of 30%, the world’s biggest supplier of batteries, collaborating with companies including BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai, Honda, Li Auto, NIO, Stellantis, Tesla, Toyota, Volkswagen, Volvo, and XPeng.

CATL helped Nio develop swappable batteries and has its own battery swapping service, along with a service for battery renting, commonly named under the flag of ‘Battery-as-a-Service’ (BaaS). It allows for cheaper EVs as the battery remains the company’s property and is rented for a monthly fee, something NIO is proposing, too.

CATL signed up China’s FAW Motor as the first customer for its new Evogo battery swapping service and expects to extend it to other Chinese automakers. And it recently told Reuters it was developing swapping services not only for China but “to meet the demand of global markets”.

Pressure from the government

In addition to Geely and Changan, Nio says it is in talks with at least five other companies for similar partnerships. Whether that includes CATL, FAW, or BYD isn’t clear yet. However, the Chinese authorities are keen advocates of swapping technology.

The Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information (MIIT) released the global auto industry’s first standards for swapping technology last year. If the Chinese government decides to enforce battery standards, making swapping among brands a common thing, that could become a global game-changer. If they want to keep a foothold on the world’s biggest car market, Western EV makers would have to follow.