A subsidiary of China’s CATL has signed a deal with Chinese ride-hailing platform T3 Chuxing to develop autonomous ride-hailing vehicles featuring CATL’s skateboard chassis for electric vehicles, as the world’s largest battery maker continues to ramp up spending in the highly promising robotaxi market. The companies will jointly design, develop and test robotaxis that will be built upon CATL’s so-called Bedrock skateboard chassis, which integrates the battery directly into the frame of the car, according to a statement published Tuesday.
Such technology is an ideal solution for developing highly autonomous vehicles, as it enables decoupled development of upper and lower car bodies and is adaptable to various car models, from sedans to vans, CATL told TechNode at a press event in December. One of several rivals to Didi, China’s biggest ride-hailer, T3 was launched in July 2019 with backing from state-owned automakers FAW, Dongfeng and Changan, as well as tech giants Alibaba and Tencent. The announcement comes weeks after CATL said it had set up a 3 billion yuan ($418 million) joint venture for robotaxis with Alibaba’s fintech arm, Ant Group, and Ant-backed mobility platform Hellobike. [TechNode reporting, press release, in Chinese]
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