On December 24, CATL introduced the Bedrock Chassis, the world’s first ultra-safe skateboard chassis designed to withstand a 120 km/h frontal impact without catching fire or exploding. This innovation sets a new standard in intelligent chassis safety, ensuring comprehensive protection across various scenarios and speeds.
The Bedrock Chassis employs a battery-centered design, using Cell-to-Chassis integration technology that merges battery cells directly into the chassis, sharing structural elements. This approach allows the chassis to absorb 85% of collision energy, significantly higher than the 60% typically absorbed by conventional designs.
CATL’s Bedrock Chassis has undergone rigorous tests, including a groundbreaking 120 km/h frontal pole impact test. This extreme scenario, equivalent to a fall from a 56-meter height, generates collision energy 4.6 times greater than standard 56 km/h tests under C-NCAP (China New Car Assessment Program).
Despite the high speed and concentrated impact, the chassis demonstrated unparalleled safety, avoiding fire, explosions, or thermal runaway. The chassis features a three-dimensional biomimetic tortoise shell structure for robust protection, an aircraft carrier-grade arresting system to disperse crash forces, and materials like submarine-grade hot-formed steel (2000 MPa) and aerospace-grade aluminum alloy (600 MPa) for enhanced rigidity.
CATL has integrated cutting-edge battery technologies, including NP technology and high-ductility insulation films, ensuring exceptional performance even under extreme conditions. The system achieves high-voltage disconnection within 0.01 seconds of impact and discharges residual energy in 0.2 seconds, setting new safety benchmarks.
The battery cells underwent tests such as high-speed sled impacts, 90-degree bending, and sawing, passing all without incidents of fire or explosions, further solidifying their reliability.The Bedrock Chassis unlocks new possibilities for modular and intelligent vehicle designs, addressing industry challenges like high costs and lengthy development cycles.
Its flexible architecture, standardized interfaces, and decoupled chassis-body design enable faster vehicle development—reducing production timelines from over 36 months to just 12–18 months. AVATR, the first automaker to adopt the Bedrock Chassis, signed an agreement with CATL’s skateboard chassis division, CAIT-SH, to advance safer and smarter travel solutions.
CATL’s Bedrock Chassis not only redefines safety standards but also paves the way for a trillion-yuan market in modular and intelligent vehicle platforms. As CATL continues to innovate, it remains committed to enhancing safety and creating a sustainable ecosystem for electric vehicles. Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL) is a global leader in new energy technology, renowned for its innovative solutions and services in energy applications. Listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange since June 2018 (stock code 300750), CATL has been the global leader in EV battery consumption volume for seven consecutive years as of 2023 and has led the global energy storage battery market share for three consecutive years. Widely trusted by leading EV and energy storage partners, CATL has set ambitious goals to achieve carbon neutrality in its core operations by 2025 and across its entire battery supply chain by 2035, reaffirming its commitment to advancing the global energy transition.
