CATL, the world's largest battery-maker, has signed a battery-swap focused joint venture with ride-hailing giant Didi, according to a news report published by CnEVPost on Jan. 28.

Under the new JV, CATL and Didi plan to rapidly roll out battery-swap stations at scale, promoting battery swap-enabled electric vehicles and improving the operational efficiency of the publicly available battery-swap network.

Both the companies have not disclosed the name of the new JV company.

The formal JV announcement was made by the two companies on Jan. 26 in Ningde, Fujian, China, where CATL is headquartered. Notably, Didi Chairman and CEO Cheng Wei and CATL Chairman and General Manager Robin Zeng were present at the signing ceremony between the two companies, the report added.

The JV company aims to provide battery-swap services to the ride-hailing market, leveraging the technical advantages and operational capabilities of both the companies, the report said, citing CATL.

It added that the two companies plan to lead service and technology standards on battery-swap services to improve resource utilization and social operation efficiency.

The JV with Didi has come two years after CATL had officially launched its battery-swap brand Evogo in January 2022.

Notably, Evogo offers swappable battery blocks, named Choco-SEBs, where EVs can deploy one or more swappable batteries as per the required driving range.