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## Who is Jowan Technology?
Jowan Technology is a high-tech private enterprise with mixed ownership structure of employee stockholding, incubated by GAC Group. According to Pei Feng, the establishment of Jowan Technology is due to the "Double Hundred Action" of state-owned enterprise reform in 2018. At that time, the State Council's State-owned Enterprise Reform Leading Group selected more than 100 central and local state-owned backbone enterprises for mixed ownership reform.
Jowan Technology was incubated and established under this background.
Pei Feng explained that "Wan" represents the meaning of the bay area, "Jv" means the second-generation technology of Jowan Technology, the supercapacitor battery. "Technology R&D" indicates that it is a technology-driven enterprise.
"We value innovation, especially in creating our own strong suits, which we call 'forging strengths'," said Pei Feng.
Actually, the proposal of incubating this team by GAC can be traced back to the period when GAC Research Institute was laying out the technology research and development of new energy vehicles.
Pei Feng recalled that the GAC Research Institute was founded in 2006. He joined the new energy team in 2007 and started the first mass production project in 2009. In 2010, GAC realized that the development of new energy vehicles must overcome the core three-electric technology. Since then, they have invested heavily in research and development.
At the same time, they also faced a new problem, how to turn breakthrough research results into products and empower new energy vehicles.
“We studied a lot of methods at that time. Finally, after discussing with GAC, it was decided to incubate the team. This can not only retain talents, provide them with a platform, but also help stimulate the team’s enthusiasm.”
“This issue was raised in 2017 and some program discussions were made. In 2018, it coincided with the “Double Hundred Actions” of mixed ownership reform, and the establishment of Joway Automotive Technologies Co., Ltd. was accelerated.”
When it comes to stimulating enthusiasm, we often think of salary incentives first.
Surprisingly, from GAC Research Institute to Joway Automotive Technologies, their core backbone not only did not receive higher salaries but also reduced their salaries.
Pei Feng said, “When Joway was established, GAC Group held 49% of the shares. We joked that we only took 49% of the salary. Therefore, the salaries of new employees, including mine, were basically halved.”
Of course, Joway will have other incentive mechanisms, such as full staff equity. In Pei Feng’s view, this method is quite effective. “Everyone has a stronger sense of ownership, and salaries are not so important.” As the company grows larger, they will also make market-oriented compensation system construction.
Talking about the company’s scale, Pei Feng said that their plan by the end of this year is to expand to about 200 people. When mass production and supply begin at the end of the year, the production line workers plan to reach 500 people next year.
With the expansion of the company’s scale and the construction of the production line, Joway Automotive Technologies has undergone two rounds of financing. Pei Feng said that Joway held its first round of financing at the beginning, which could be called pre-A round financing, with hundreds of millions of yuan and diluted about 10% of equity. Now they are launching the A round of financing, which requires about 800-1,000 million yuan, used for capacity construction, second-generation technology research, and daily liquidity supplement.
What did Joway Automotive Technologies do?
The two black technologies carried by the Ean V Plus supercharging model – ultra-rapid battery technology and A480 supercharging pile, are both the works of Joway Automotive Technologies. In addition, there is a Jumbo Capacitor battery technology that has not been publicized yet.
(1) 6C Battery: the product of the system engineering and comprehensive innovative thinking
The six-fold charging rate to achieve “charging for 5 minutes, driving for 200 kilometers” is the achievement of ultra-rapid battery technology.The first generation of super fast-charging batteries developed by Giants Bay R&D has successfully solved two major problems in lithium-ion batteries: low migration rate of lithium ions and low insertion/removal efficiency.
As for the separator and electrolyte, Giants Bay R&D uses highly porous coated ceramic separators and a new type of low viscosity and high conductivity electrolyte to reduce the migration resistance of lithium ions in the electrolyte.
In terms of negative electrodes, since the insertion/removal efficiency of ions is low, Giants Bay R&D uses new technologies such as soft carbon/hard carbon/graphene encapsulation and modification to enhance the rate of insertion/removal.
As for the conductive agent, Giants Bay R&D uses a three-dimensional graphene structure to build an efficient conductive network to improve the electrode conductivity.
The three-dimensional graphene structure is the most concerned focus in the industry.
As we all know, graphene generally refers to a two-dimensional structure of single-layer or 3-5 layer graphite.
Pei Feng said, “You can imagine this structure as a spherical shape, with carbon atoms arranged in a two-dimensional manner showing the characteristics of few-layer graphene, but not re-stacked into multiple layers. We call it three-dimensional graphene.”
In Pei Feng’s view, graphene is not only an excellent conductive agent, but also has great potential in lightweighting. Therefore, Giants Bay has been focusing on graphene in the materials field for a long time.
Currently, the three-dimensional graphene conductive agent is self-produced by Giants Bay R&D. The battery cell is currently manufactured by a battery cell factory and assembled into packs by Giants Bay.
(2) Fast charging: provide technology or equipment supply; high voltage platform is the trend
The second black technology is the ultra-fast charging station. This is also the research and development result of Giants Bay R&D. The peak power of this charging station can reach 1000V and the current can reach 600A. It adopts a liquid-cooled charging system and matches flexible charging function.
With the technology in hand, Giants Bay does not intend to invest in and operate charging stations on a large scale. They hope to participate as a contributor to promote the construction of the entire ecosystem.
The reason for developing high-power charging is because in Pei Feng’s view, this is both a market demand and a technological trend. For example, European and Japanese car companies have already achieved high-voltage platforms, because after efficiency is improved, energy consumption is reduced, and overall cost savings are achieved. “Currently, the scale of the high-voltage system has not been reached, and the cost is slightly higher. For example, the voltage of the IGBT switch in the controller can be increased from 750V to 1200V.”
With the expansion of scale, the total cost of the high-voltage system can be the same as or even lower than that of the current mainstream voltage platform.
(3) Giant capacitor battery: dielectric constant far exceeds existing materials
Giants Bay R&D is also exploring cutting-edge technologies.If the 6C fast charging capability of the super fast-charge battery is called the first generation of super energy storage devices, then the supercapacitor battery is the second generation of super energy storage devices developed by Guwan.
Pei Feng introduces that the supercapacitor battery can be understood as a physically or physically and chemically-based energy storage device. It is developed based on the dielectric capacitor. The energy density of a general dielectric capacitor is relatively low, but the power density is high. On the other hand, electrochemical batteries have a lower power density but slightly higher energy density.
Generally, the supercapacitor is a composite of a dielectric capacitor and an electrochemical battery.
The most important thing about the supercapacitor battery is the dielectric constant of the dielectric material in the middle of the material. Pei Feng explains that they have invented a new type of solid electrolyte material that combines giant dielectric and ferroelectric properties. Its dielectric constant is over a million times higher than that of existing materials.
According to the official website of Guwan Technology Research, the energy density of this supercapacitor battery can be 5-10 times that of ordinary power batteries.
The advantages of the supercapacitor battery also include: fast charging speed, energy utilization rate up to 95%; long cycle life, can be charged and discharged 100,000-500,000 times, with a service life of at least 10 years; high safety factor, no flammable and explosive substances; in addition, it has good ultra-low temperature characteristics, with a temperature range of -50-170℃.
This technology has not yet been officially promoted by Guwan and should be reserved for future release.
Pei Feng stated that the technology submitted an application for one of the invention patents in December of last year, and the invention patent authorization was obtained in June of this year, which is a rare speed. In the major categories, such materials belong to the category of functional ceramics or glass materials. “The plan is to commercialize it by the end of 2023 or early 2024.”
Goal: Forging a Long Board and Benchmarking the Best Companies in the World
The positioning of Guwan Technology Research is not as simple as a technology and product supplier behind GAC Aion, but aims to output technology and products to the entire industry, becoming a high-tech company in the field of electrification and intelligence.
Pei Feng stated to the “Electric Vehicle Observer” that Guwan Technology Research initially established a market-oriented approach to the entire automotive industry, and is now in contact with potential customers. Currently, the main vehicle is Aion.
First, they need to make breakthroughs in the field of electric vehicles. For example, in terms of electrification, Pei Feng believes that power batteries are the most important component of electric vehicles, and their cost ratio is higher than that of engines. The automaker must find a way to control some of it.
However, he explained that this does not mean that the automaker will fully produce batteries on its own, but that it must have a certain ratio of both procurement and production.In addition to the already completed production capacity, Juewan is also constructing production capacity. Currently, its under-construction production capacity is located in Guangzhou, mainly engaged in the R&D and production of super-fast charging batteries, next-generation energy storage devices, and PACK systems. The designed capacity is 8GWh, and it will be fully constructed and put into production in the first quarter of 2023. The built production line is the Phase-One battery PACK production line located in Nansha, with a planned capacity of 4GWh.
In terms of overall battery production capacity planning, Juewan Tech plans to achieve a capacity of 120GWh by 2025.
Compared with technology and production capacity, Juewan Tech obviously attaches more importance to technology input.
In Pei Feng’s view, electrification and intelligence are both fundamental technologies with broad development prospects, not just limited to the field of electric vehicles. They hope to forge the strengths of these fields and establish their unique advantages.
Regarding the company’s vision, Pei Feng stated that they hope to benchmark against the world’s best technology companies and make contributions to the electrification and intelligence of society.
For Juewan Tech, all of this is just the beginning. Their released “black technology” has not yet been mass-produced. Only when the product is validated by the market can it truly enter the fast lane of new energy vehicle development.
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.