CATL to provide EV batteries to Honda

Chinese electric vehicle (EV) battery producer CATL will partner with Japanese automaker Honda to develop EV lithium-ion batteries.

CATL will provide 56GWh of batteries to equip Honda's all-electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid vehicles in a long-term contract until 2027. CATL is planning to build a production base in Japan's Tochigi prefecture in the first half of 2019 to assist Honda's research and development.

CATL has set up branches in the US, Japan, Germany and France. It produced 11.84GWh of lithium-ion power batteries in 2017, accounting for 17pc of global output that year.

Honda has separate battery providers in different countries. In the US it has partnered with automaker General Motors on advanced battery cells and module development to increase scale and manufacturing efficiencies and accelerate plans to supply all-electric vehicles.

Japan is a global leader in the adoption of hybrids and EVs with 30pc of the country's vehicles having some degree of electric substitution for traditional internal combustion engines. This compares with less than 4pc globally. It also produces around 40pc of the world's lithium-ion batteries.