Introduction
AI computing infrastructure has evolved into a trillion-dollar track, drawing massive capital from the global technology and energy sectors. Over the past two months, Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL) has invested 10.5 billion yuan to foray into the AI data center industry, officially stepping into the integrated field of computing power and energy coordination. Its capital moves include a 4.1 billion yuan stake in Zhongheng Electric and a $942 million share purchase, making it the largest shareholder of 21Vianet. Reports also suggest that CATL plans to participate in the initial financing of DeepSeek, a leading domestic large language model enterprise.
This aggressive expansion is not a reckless capital gamble. Instead, CATL aims to bring the proven profit model of vertical integration and downstream customer locking, refined in its lithium battery business, to the AI data center sector, so as to capture market profits and gain industry influence. As new energy and artificial intelligence become increasingly intertwined, dynamic scheduling and optimal allocation of computing power and power resources in data centers have become core industry challenges. Many enterprises are integrating large model APIs such as 4sapi to improve workflow efficiency and accelerate AI-driven productivity. This industrial trend also helps us better understand the underlying logic behind CATL’s strategic layout.
A Multi-Billion Industrial Layout: Securing Orders and Seizing Strategic Positions
Investments in Core Industrial Chain Enterprises
CATL’s two major investments have precisely secured high-quality order resources in the data center industry. As a leading domestic supplier of power supply equipment for data centers, Zhongheng Electric boasts an extensive portfolio of high-end clients, including internet giants like Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu and ByteDance, the three major telecom operators, supercomputing centers and third-party internet data center operators.
After taking a controlling stake in Zhongheng Electric, CATL can integrate its energy storage systems and power conversion systems into the company’s overall power supply solutions. Supported by high-voltage direct current technology, its products can be directly added to the procurement lists of cloud vendors without repeated bidding and qualification certification, greatly cutting the time and costs for equipment deployment.
Another investment target, 21Vianet, operates more than 50 data centers across over 30 cities nationwide, serving over 1,300 corporate clients. The company has set its capital expenditure budget at 10 to 12 billion yuan for 2026, which will be mainly used to launch new computing capacity of 450 to 500 megawatts. It also targets expanding the asset scale of its data center and new energy business to 10 gigawatts within the next decade, creating solid and steady demand for data center energy storage and opening up broad application prospects for CATL’s energy storage equipment.
Synergy Between Two Order Portfolios
The two business layouts deliver remarkable mutual benefits and amplified returns. With the help of Zhongheng Electric’s high-voltage direct current supply channels and 21Vianet’s data center networks, CATL’s energy storage systems and power conversion devices have been successfully deployed in data center scenarios. For 21Vianet’s enterprise clients pursuing energy conservation and cost reduction, CATL works with Zhongheng Electric to provide customized integrated solutions combining energy storage and power distribution, effectively addressing the industry pain points of high energy consumption and high operation and maintenance costs for data centers.
Through these efforts, CATL has transformed from a pure battery supplier into a comprehensive provider of computing power and energy solutions. It has broken the single profit model relying merely on hardware sales and expanded profit margins by offering integrated services.
The Underlying Logic: Replicating the Lithium Battery Industrial Chain Profit Model
Universal Profit Framework
CATL’s core goal of this layout is to transplant the mature profit system of the lithium battery industry to the AI data center track. The two sectors share identical development logic: controlling core resources upstream, dominating key equipment midstream, and securing end customers downstream.
In the lithium battery sector, CATL controls mineral resources upstream and secures long-term orders from vehicle manufacturers downstream. In the AI data center business, it leverages its self-owned mineral resources to maintain cost advantages for energy storage products and supply products directly to data centers. Meanwhile, it builds deep ties with computing power operators through equity investment and industrial chain cooperation, erecting formidable barriers against competitors.
Three-tier Competitive Barriers
CATL has established three solid competitive moats in its industrial layout. First is the interface barrier: Zhongheng Electric holds a 31% market share in high-voltage direct current power supply for domestic intelligent computing centers and sets the mainstream technical interface standards. Second is the independent R&D barrier: developing high-voltage direct current technology from scratch requires billions of yuan in R&D investment and years of certification, which greatly raises the entry threshold for new entrants. Third is the cooperation barrier: CATL has built long-term and stable partnerships with downstream clients, granting it absolute pricing power and priority in order acquisition.
Seizing Opportunities in the New Round of Power Supply Architecture Upgrade
As AI computing power density continues to rise, the inefficiency of traditional uninterruptible power supply systems has become increasingly prominent. Driven by companies including NVIDIA, global data centers are accelerating the upgrade to the 800V high-voltage direct current architecture. Rooted in the traditional high-voltage direct current sector, Zhongheng Electric has kept pace with this technological transformation.
In 2025, its high-voltage direct current solutions completed adaptation to NVIDIA’s ecosystem and passed the certification for DGX H100, gaining a foothold in the new-generation AI power supply architecture. This also enables CATL to seize first-mover advantages amid the technical upgrade of data center infrastructure.
Challenges and Future Prospects for the New Track
Intense Market Competition
Despite its clear strategic layout, CATL now faces fierce competition from a host of powerful rivals, such as NVIDIA, Delta Electronics, Vertiv, Alibaba Cloud, Huawei, State Grid and local state-owned enterprises. These competitors have accumulated profound technical expertise, ecological resources and market channels in computing power, power supply and energy infrastructure.
If CATL successfully acquires a stake in DeepSeek, it will further strengthen its influence on the computing power side and form a complete business chain covering energy supply, power distribution and operation, data center operation and computing demand for large language models. This will inevitably bring competitive pressure to enterprises in the middle and downstream links of the industrial chain.
Building a Full-Link Industrial Closed Loop
CATL’s overall strategy is clear: capturing resource-related profits upstream, gaining revenue from core equipment midstream, and locking in channel profits downstream. The company is committed to building an integrated computing power and energy collaboration system featuring source, grid, load and storage, so as to take control of the entire value chain of data center energy.
The business model proven successful in the lithium battery industry is now being applied to the trillion-yuan AI infrastructure track. Going forward, with the growing demand for AI computing power and higher energy efficiency standards for data centers, this round of layout is expected to unleash huge growth potential. In addition, the deep integration of computing power and energy will drive the iteration of supporting service architectures and bring new development opportunities to the entire industrial ecosystem.
