“He doesn’t know how to make a battery”: the head of CATL promises failure for Elon Musk’s 4680 cells

Introduced in 2020 and developed with the participation of Panasonic specialists, the 4680 battery cells initially promised Tesla a bright future in the form of inexpensive electric vehicles with a long range, but almost five years later, progress in their production is not particularly noticeable, and CATL management generally considers the whole idea a failure .

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At least in a recent, wide-ranging interview with Reuters, CATL founder and chairman Robin Zeng reminisced about his conversations with Elon Musk, which led him to believe that the Tesla chief was competent in many areas, except electrochemical processes used in the operation and production of battery cells. “We argued a lot, and I showed him what was what. He remained silent in response. He doesn’t know how to make batteries, it’s all about electrochemistry,” the head of CATL, which is the world’s largest manufacturer of traction batteries, described the results of his discussion with Elon Musk. According to Zeng, he directly told Musk that the 4680 cylindrical battery “will be a failure and will never succeed.”

However, since 2020, Tesla has made some progress in increasing production volumes of size 4680 cells. It produces them at a plant in Texas, and was forced to abandon initial plans to establish production in Germany. If in June of this year the 10 millionth copy of cell 4680 was produced, then three months later the 100 millionth was produced. Tesla management emphasized that Cybertruck pickups using these cells, in terms of production volumes, are in no way limited to these battery cells. Model Y crossovers produced in Texas are also partially equipped with 4680 cells, but Tesla Semi trucks do without them, although the opposite would be beneficial for them both technically and economically.

According to rumors, Tesla has encountered difficulties converting the production of 4680 cells to the “dry” cathode manufacturing method, although it uses it in anode production. Elon Musk even allegedly delivered an ultimatum to his subordinates, demanding that all problems with the production of cells like 4680 be resolved by the end of this year, or that the idea be abandoned altogether. It is noteworthy that the Japanese company Panasonic, which collaborates with Tesla, came to the conclusion that the production technology of 4680 cells needs to be improved. Tesla is believed to have hired a specialist to audit its manufacturing processes and eliminate bottlenecks in the technology.