(Yicai Global) Sept. 25 -- Chinese electric vehicle battery giant Contemporary Amperex Technology inked a collaboration agreement yesterday with logistics and property giant GLP China Holdings to set up a joint-venture asset management firm to quicken the shift to electrified and smart transport, CATL said in a statement yesterday.

The JV will hold, manage and operate CATL's cells, energy-storage systems and various cars and ships these systems support to lower the threshold for use of new energies on a large scale for logistics and transport companies by turning new energy assets into services to promote them and expand their application.

One key focus of the JV future will be to transform the assets of power battery systems into services to develop battery-swapping heavy trucks, provide relevant application scenarios and infrastructure, and lower users' financial thresholds. Operators of such trucks will no longer have to lose money while awaiting their recharging, since swapping takes little time, and uses high-performance cells as replacements.

The two will also collaborate per the JV framework, teaming with Shanghai-based GLP's unit focusing on the company’s ecology to construct hubs and facilities for supply chains, trunk roads for transport featuring autonomous vehicles, networks for delivery within cities, and cars and equipment that are green, electrified and smart. They will also advance the smartification and intensification of logistics, warehousing, transport and delivery.

Founded in 2011 and based in Ningde in southeastern Fujian province, CATL researches, develops, manufactures and sells power battery systems for new energy vehicles. The company took in business revenue of about CNY18.8 billion (USD2.75 billion) in the first half, down about 7.1 percent annually from the impact of Covid-19 and declining market demand.

The battery maker has recently stepped on the gas for its positioning by injecting capital into high-quality listed firms in both the up and down streams of the power battery sector from both home and abroad via securities investment, while still focusing on its major business, CATL announced in August, adding the investment will be up to CNY19.1 billion.

Editor: Ben Armour