(Yicai Global) Aug. 31 -- Chinese electric carmaker BYD’s CNY10 billion (USD1.5 billion) factory to make safer so-called blade batteries is reportedly to go into trial operation before the end of this year.

The main structure of the plant’s two main workshops was completed recently and equipment will be installed before Oct. 15, The Paper reported on Aug. 28. The first production line will start trials before Dec. 15 and all four lines of the plant’s first phase will go into operation by next April.

Shenzhen-based BYD showed off the new battery pack, which is designed to greatly increase safety and volumetric energy density, in March. It uses lithium iron phosphate technology and singular cells arranged together in an array to increase both space utilization compared with conventional battery packs and mileage by more than 50 percent.

As a key to BYD’s business positioning in central China, the plant in Ningxiang, Hunan province will mainly supply power lithium batteries for the firm’s new energy vehicles. The first phase, with an investment of about CNY5 billion, is expected to log sales of about CNY10 billion a year when finished.

The plant will have robots, management execution systems, intelligent logistics systems, and multi-functional unmanned vehicles to achieve automation and informatization of production lines and smart interconnection of automated the  production lines’ hardware and software.

Editor: Peter Thomas