Nio will start to produce high-voltage battery packs developed in-house from 2024.
The electric car manufacturer currently has more than 400 employees working on the research and development of battery technologies and will begin producing an 800-volt battery pack in the second half of 2024.
Speaking with analysts last week, Nio chairman William Li confirmed that the new battery packs will be used by new, affordable models due in 2024. While specifics about these models aren’t known, they will reportedly vary in price between 200,000 yuan and 300,000 yuan ($30,000 to $45,000).
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Li added that Nio will use both self-produced and batteries sourced from third parties in the future, Reuters reports.
The latest model introduced by the Chinese carmaker is the ET5. Unveiled in December last year, the vehicle serves as a rival to the likes of the Tesla Model 3 and BMW i4. It is offered with a 75 kWh battery pack that is said to be good for 342 miles (550 km) of range, a 100 kWh pack with over 435 miles (700 km) of range and a massive 150 kWh pack with a claimed 621 miles (1,000 km) of range. All variants come with a pair of electric motors producing a combined 483 hp and 516 lb-ft (700 Nm) of torque, allowing the sedan to hit 62 mph (100 km/h) in 4.3 seconds.
Nio has also equipped the ET5 with its full suite of semi-autonomous driving systems, including the NIO Autonomous Driving (NAD), NIO Aquila Super Sensing, and NIO Adam Super Computing systems.
The interior of the ET5 is also quite noteworthy. It features a 10.2-inch HDR digital instrument cluster while also sporting a large tablet-style infotainment screen. Nio has also fitted the EV with its PanoCinema system that uses augmented and virtual reality technology to project an effective screen size of 201-inches at six meters. The ET5 also sports ambient lighting, a Dolby Atmos 7.1.4 surround sound system, and a smart key.
