GAC Aion has extended warranties, while CALB is involved in a batch battery defect issue.
It has been learned that late on July 18th, CALB issued an announcement establishing a "direct" maintenance channel for owners of GAC Aion AION S vehicles equipped with its 177Ah lithium iron phosphate batteries. Owners can now go directly to CALB service points for free inspection and repair, bypassing the 4S dealerships. On the same day, GAC Aion issued an apology statement, raising the warranty standard for the affected models from 8 years or 150,000 kilometers to 8 years or 300,000 kilometers.
The two announcements placed side by side reveal a clear divergence. GAC Aion acknowledges "battery failure," while CALB's statement refers to "battery system failures under specific operating conditions," never mentioning the term "manufacturing defect."
A third-party inspection report concluded that "after excluding external factors such as collisions or water immersion, the fault points to an internal manufacturing defect in the battery." A report from Xinhua News Agency on July 14th more directly pointed to a batch manufacturing defect.
With 182 complaints and over 210,000 vehicles potentially affected, this power battery manufacturer, ranked fourth domestically by installation volume, ultimately offered a response devoid of the word "defect."
This was not a proactive step but a move made because the issue could no longer be concealed.
After the After-Sales Chain Broke
CALB was forced into the spotlight.
The after-sales order in the power battery industry was traditionally clear-cut: battery suppliers are responsible to the automaker, the automaker is responsible to the consumer, and 4S dealerships act as the execution endpoint. This long-established chain completely failed regarding the 177Ah battery failures.
The affected vehicles are mostly ride-hailing cars used for commercial operation. Owners presented third-party inspection reports to 4S dealerships, which cited mileage exceeding warranty standards as grounds for requiring self-funded battery pack replacements, often costing tens of thousands of yuan. Some dealerships refused compensation citing "lack of full maintenance history at the dealership." The 4S shop pointed to the battery factory, the battery factory pointed to the automaker, and the automaker pointed back to the 4S shop—owners were passed around in circles.
The experience of a Suzhou-based owner is representative. After the vehicle reached 230,000 kilometers, a system fault occurred. The 4S dealership confirmed a battery quality defect but refused free repair due to being out of warranty, only offering a used battery pack replacement. Some owners reported the initial failure occurring on March 7th, with failures recurring in May and July after repair.
CALB's "direct" maintenance channel is essentially a substitute solution following the complete failure of the original after-sales system. The announcement states that "owners using CALB batteries who encounter battery system failures can go directly to the company's service points for free inspection." For a battery supplier to bypass the automaker and 4S dealership system to provide services directly to end-users is unprecedented in the power battery industry.
This unconventional move leaves two unresolved questions: Had it not been for the public report by Xinhua News Agency and the concentrated exposure of 182 complaints, when would this "direct channel" have opened? Following this incident, how should the boundary of responsibility between power battery companies and end consumers be redrawn?
Extended Warranties Address Cost, Not Quality
GAC Aion's response path is relatively clear: a three-pronged approach of apology, warranty extension, and subsidies. The warranty standard was raised from 8 years/150,000 km to 8 years/300,000 km, supplemented by a battery big data proactive warning mechanism, with ride-hailing owners eligible for operational suspension subsidies if repairs exceed five days.
Reasoning backwards, this solution does address the immediate crisis. The 150,000 to 250,000-kilometer range, where failures have concentrated, is now fully covered by the warranty, removing the legal basis for the core dispute of "denial due to exceeding warranty."
However, the warranty extension only covers the cost dispute and does not address the root cause of the failures. The conclusion of an "internal battery manufacturing defect" will not resolve itself simply because the warranty period is extended. Vehicles not yet at 150,000 km, those already past 300,000 km, and other models like the Aion V and Aion Y equipped with the same battery cells but not covered by this warranty extension—the same manufacturing defect exists, differing only in the timing of its manifestation.
This warranty upgrade only applies to the Aion S series, not all models equipped with the 177Ah cells. The Aion V and Aion Y, also using CALB's 177Ah batteries and having reported insulation failures, are not covered. The logic behind this differential treatment is understandable: the S series is the "king of ride-hailing," with 2023 sales of 220,904 units, a 72% ride-hailing share, accumulating mileage the fastest and concentrating failure exposure. Other models are not without issues; they just haven't reached the critical point of concentrated exposure.
Industry Competition Compresses Validation Cycles
The 150,000-kilometer mark has become a revealing threshold.
It has been learned that a battery repair engineer in Tianjin disclosed to media that he has handled over thirty problematic battery cases involving multiple areas in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. "The issue most likely originates from the battery design end. Manufacturers, perhaps rushing to assemble products to capture market share, may have significantly shortened validation and testing time. Ultimately, this is a result of compressed validation cycles under excessive industry competition."
This is a statement worth repeated scrutiny.
The power battery production chain is complex, requiring extremely high precision in quality control. Flaws in electrode coating processes, substandard cell assembly precision, virtual or missed welds on ICBs, immature sealing processes, imperfect BMS logic calibration, lax final electrical testing—a lapse in any single link can evolve into swelling, leakage, or insulation failure after tens of thousands of kilometers of charge-discharge cycles.
These defects are not identified in factory exit inspections; they require operational cycles measured in years to manifest. And it is precisely this "latency period" that accurately overlaps with the warranty period and the depreciation cycle of commercial vehicles. By the time problems concentrate and erupt, vehicles have crossed the warranty line, and cost pressures are transmitted down the supply chain, ultimately landing on the end-user.
From January to May 2026, CALB's installed capacity grew 36.3% year-on-year to 23.8 GWh, raising its global market share to fourth place. The flip side of rapid expansion is the reality of continuously squeezed validation cycles. In 2025, the State Administration for Market Regulation received 31,000 complaints about automotive defects, with power battery failures accounting for 7.8%. CATL Chairman Robin Zeng publicly criticized industry chaos, stating some competitors "only know how to poach talent and steal technology," engaging in cutthroat competition with low-price strategies.
On July 1st, the new national standard GB 38031-2025 officially took effect, establishing a zero-tolerance baseline of "no fire, no explosion" during thermal runaway. While standards are rising, existing problems remain unresolved.
The phrasing "specific operating conditions" in CALB's announcement remained unchanged from the staff's response to media on July 18th to the formal late-night announcement.
The third-party inspection report confirmed that "after excluding external factors such as collisions or water immersion, the fault points to an internal manufacturing defect in the battery." Usage scenarios, driving habits, and charging methods are not decisive variables. The problem existed when the battery left the factory.
GAC Aion acknowledged "battery failure." CALB did not acknowledge "manufacturing defect." As of the close on July 17th, CALB's total market capitalization was HKD 33.4 billion. The capital market's reaction to the word "defect" is something no listed company can afford to take lightly.
But the phrase "specific operating conditions" cannot cover up the swelling of battery cells or the leakage of electrolyte. The third-party inspection reports held by ride-hailing drivers, "whose car loans are not yet paid off while their vehicles are already disabled," do not lie. The 300,000-kilometer warranty extension covers problems that have already surfaced. Those not yet exposed, or on the path to exposure, are the truly disquieting part.
CALB has taken this step. The real test is just beginning.
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