China’s largest electric-vehicle (EV) battery manufacturer has completed a multibillion-dollar financing, drawing in global investment banking giants including UBS AG and JPMorgan Chase & Co, reported Caixin.
Shenzhen-listed Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. (CATL) raised nearly RMB 19.7 billion ($2.8 billion) from nine investors through a private share placement last week, according to an exchange filing on Friday. The amount more than triples the money raised from its IPO two years ago.
The deal aims to expand production capacity and fund research and development (R&D), underscoring CATL’s ambition to better compete with foreign rivals in a lucrative but increasingly competitive market.
The company, which supplies batteries to automakers including BMW Group and Volkswagen AG, raised about RMB 6.3 billion, or nearly a third of the total, from four foreign investors after a bidding process. That included RMB 1.1 billion from Swiss financial titan UBS and RMB 1.5 billion from two subsidiaries of American conglomerate JPMorgan Chase. The rest came from a subsidiary of major Japanese automaker Honda Motor Co. Ltd.