CATL secures world’s largest sodium-ion battery order with Hyperstrong

Battery manufacturing heavyweight CATL has secured what is described as the world’s largest sodium-ion battery order with Chinese system integrator HyperStrong. On April 27, the two companies announced a three-year partnership with a total order volume of 60 GWh.

“This collaboration signifies that CATL has successfully overcome challenges across the full mass-production chain of sodium-ion batteries, reaching large-scale delivery capability. As the largest sodium-ion battery order globally to date, it marks the beginning of a new phase in the commercialization of sodium-ion technology,” CATL said in a press release.

Since 2016, CATL has invested nearly CNY 10 billion (about $1.5 billion) in sodium-ion R&D. The company says it has significantly improved energy density through morphology control and surface modification. On the manufacturing side, it claims to have resolved key mass-production challenges in hard carbon anode production – such as foaming and moisture control – using technologies including angstrom-level pore size tuning, surface molecular water-locking, and adaptive dynamic formation, aimed at ensuring batch-to-batch consistency at scale.

Most recently, CATL unveiled a new sodium-ion battery for energy storage at ESIE 2026 in Beijing on April 1. A key design feature is its platform compatibility with CATL’s existing 587 Ah lithium storage cell. The sodium-ion cell uses the same enclosure dimensions, which the company says enables high compatibility across system design, manufacturing lines, and supply chains, helping reduce switching costs for customers.

The cell is described as a large-format product exceeding 300 Ah, with an energy density of around 160 Wh/kg, system energy efficiency of 97%, cycle life of more than 15,000 cycles at 80% capacity retention, and an operating temperature range of −40°C to 70°C.

In terms of applications, CATL’s new product targets 2-hour to 8-hour utility-scale storage, shared storage, renewable energy hubs, and data center energy storage.

The chemistry uses a long-cycle hard carbon anode and a layered oxide composite cathode. CATL also highlights safety performance, stating the battery showed no thermal runaway in nail penetration, crush, and overcharge tests. The design is cobalt-free and nickel-free and uses aluminum foil instead of copper foil, which the company says contributes to lower material costs.

So far, sodium-ion technology has remained in the background as lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery prices declined steadily to roughly $50/kWh at the cell level. However, market conditions have recently shifted. Over the past six months, mainstream 314 Ah LFP storage cells have risen about 20% since October, as lithium supply tightens and demand strengthens. Against this backdrop, the scale of the latest supply deal suggests sodium-ion is moving into early mass production – an important step toward realizing its potential cost advantage over LFP, which could reach 30-40%.

The deal is part of an existing partnership between CATL and HyperStrong, which last November announced a 200 GWh battery supply agreement spanning 2026 to 2028. At the time, the companies did not disclose the technology mix behind the agreement, so the 60 GWh announced on Monday may have already been included within that framework.