A new partnership between Honda Motor and Chinese battery conglomerate Contemporary Amperex Technology (aka CATL) to develop a next-generation electric vehicle for the motor company with at least 300 kilometers (186 miles) of range*. The car would hit the market at just over $18,000.
The holistic partnership includes on-vehicle battery and supporting hardware development, electric vehicle performance testing, production technology, and battery specifications.
The vehicle will be based on Honda’s Fit. Honda is looking to sell more than 100,000 of the new vehicles per year, which would make the new electric vehicle the brand’s highest volume electric vehicle. The vehicle will be introduced in China and other global markets in the first two quarters of 2020.
*That being said, the 300 kilometer (186 mile) range is likely not an EPA-rated range estimate but an estimate based on the Chinese system, which is much more “generous” (read: inaccurate).
The new partnership forms the foundation of a larger play by Honda to ramp up its presence in electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles to 65% of global sales by 2030. Fueled by the booming domestic plug-in vehicle market in China, CATL is adding significant production capacity with a target of 50 gigawatt-hours per year by the end of 2020.