This is an era where the energy revolution and manufacturing transformation intersect. Energy storage technology, centered on “next-generation cells + intelligent manufacturing,” is reshaping the global energy landscape. On July 30, the “CNESA BESS-Smart Manufacturing Forum” ignited a storm of ideas at the CALB Changzhou base.
This forum was organized by the China Energy Storage Alliance, co-organized by CALB, Ainet.cn & Xinhua News Agency Intelligent Zero Carbon, focusing on the deep integration of energy storage technology innovation and intelligent manufacturing. Leading enterprises in the industry chain, including Siemens Digital Industries Software, FANUC Robotics, Festo, Autowell, CALB, and Risen Energy, participated. Through keynote speeches and roundtable discussions, they explored cost-reduction and efficiency-enhancement paths and ecological collaborative innovation in the era of new-generation cells.
Breaking Technical Barriers
Large-Capacity Cells Drive System Integration Transformation
With the vigorous development of the energy storage industry, the energy storage market is accelerating from “scale competition” toward “value cultivation,” and technological innovation is expanding from individual components to system-level solutions. Energy storage technology is undergoing full life-cycle cost optimization and comprehensive improvement of scenario adaptability.
Cell and system suppliers represented by CALB emphasize achieving technical cost reduction through material innovation and system integration. Risen Energy, starting from end-product design, addresses installation and O&M pain points through modularization, lightweighting, and intelligence. Both approaches point to the core proposition currently facing the energy storage industry.
Zhang Rui, CALB Technology Group Co., Ltd.
Energy Storage Product Director
Zhang Rui, Energy Storage Product Director of CALB, stated that CALB’s technology trends focus on reducing full life-cycle costs through high-energy-density cell iteration, system high-voltage design, and functional integration to achieve dual reductions in investment and O&M costs. Through technological innovation and intelligent deployment, CALB launched the 392 cell, 314B long-cycle cell, and 6.25MWh container system, achieving a 25% increase in energy while reducing costs by 18%, and ensuring smooth technological iteration through compatible production line design.
Gou Zhiguo, Risen Energy
Chief Electrical Design Engineer
Gou Zhiguo, Chief Electrical Design Engineer at Risen Energy, stated that in the current mainstream energy storage market, small-capacity residential products below 48kWh are already widespread, and large-capacity C&I energy storage products above 120kWh are already mature. However, the 50–120kWh range still lacks high-quality, mature products for customers to choose from. Risen Energy launched the Risen Stack1 stackable all-in-one machine, perfectly covering the 48–120kWh range, providing flexible expansion solutions and effectively lowering customers’ initial investment threshold. Through technological upgrades or design in extreme safety, simplified transportation, easy installation, and intelligent temperature control, the solution addresses the industry’s cost-reduction needs from multiple dimensions—investment, O&M, and usage—providing efficient and flexible solutions for distributed energy storage.
Intelligent Manufacturing Upgrade
Digital Software and Robotics Reshape Production Landscape
Currently, key performance indicators of batteries continue to improve, and production processes are constantly innovating—from material R&D to manufacturing process optimization, platform assembly processes, and fast-charging technology—accelerating the entire industry chain’s iteration. In the face of fierce market competition, only by leveraging technological innovation and achieving ultimate cost-control capability can companies stand out, gain market share, and maintain profitability. This offline forum gathered leading companies from various segments of intelligent manufacturing to share progress and applications in digital software, industrial robotics, and 3D vision technologies.
Li Wei, Siemens Digital Industries Software
Technical Director for Energy and Battery Industry
Siemens and Festo both emphasized the value of software-hardware collaboration. Li Wei, Technical Director for Energy and Battery Industry at Siemens, stated that Siemens has built an end-to-end solution matrix covering the entire core business and intelligent manufacturing processes of battery energy storage enterprises, from R&D design and production execution to recycling management, forming a digital twin system. In the cell manufacturing stage of the energy storage industry chain, Siemens’ structured process expression technology enables interconnection of equipment parameters, solving the inefficiency of traditional form-based management. In the system integration stage, BMS and thermal runaway simulation technology improve energy storage safety through multi-condition simulation, particularly meeting the stringent thermal management requirements of the new national standard. In addition, Siemens’ industrial AI technology deeply integrates with knowledge of the battery manufacturing industry, leveraging Siemens’ robust industrial database and case experience to help the battery energy storage industry accelerate into the intelligent era.
Lu Yijiang, Festo Greater China
Key Account Manager for New Energy Industry
Festo focuses on the technical concept of “pneumatic-electric integration and software-hardware synergy,” providing customers with one-stop solutions. Lu Yijiang, Key Account Manager for the New Energy Industry, stated that Festo’s new-generation VTUX valve terminal platform integrates solenoid valves, proportional valves, and vacuum generators, reducing wiring costs and installation space by 30%. The Festo AX digital solution monitors data in real-time and uses artificial intelligence (AI) for analysis. Its predictive maintenance software monitors the health status of cylinders, provides early risk warnings, facilitates maintenance planning, and avoids unexpected downtime. Festo is committed to improving customers’ productivity and injecting new momentum into automation development.
The automation level of the battery energy storage industry is high, and customers are paying more attention to building intelligent and flexible production models to adapt to changes in market demand. FANUC, AUBO Robotics, and Mech-Mind each provided cutting-edge solutions and practical cases to meet customers’ needs for optimizing production processes.
Wang Hao, FANUC Robotics
Deputy Director, New Energy Sales Department
Wang Hao, Deputy Director of FANUC Robotics’ New Energy Sales Department, stated that in response to the growth trend of domestic and export business in the energy storage industry and the increase in battery pack weight, FANUC leverages heavy-duty robots combined with high-rigidity rails to achieve automatic warehousing of 700 kg energy storage containers. High-speed robots, with vibration suppression technology and temperature drift control, lead the industry in cycle time for photovoltaic cell and cell stacking processes. From a safety perspective, the DCS dual-CPU system monitors fixture movement paths and uses the Smooth Stop mechanism to reduce the working area, significantly lowering space costs.
Ruan Sheng, AUBO Robotics
Marketing Director
Ruan Sheng, Marketing Director at AUBO Robotics, addressed issues in the current lithium battery industry such as single-machine automation, manual product switching, long delivery cycles, and low production line intelligence, offering targeted solutions. AUBO’s collaborative robots can be deployed quickly to achieve flexible production and shorten the investment return period for single-station automation upgrades. Its modular joint (servo + integrated drive control) supports rapid deployment of process packages such as gluing and screw locking. The three-encoder design resists temperature drift, and on-site commissioning time is only one-tenth that of traditional gantry systems.
Zheng Hao, Mech-Mind Robotics Co., Ltd.
Sales Manager
Zheng Hao, Sales Manager at Mech-Mind, presented the application of AI + 3D vision in manufacturing upgrades. AI + 3D vision supports intelligent and flexible lithium battery production, addressing challenges such as high-precision positioning, complex material recognition, and compatibility with multiple product types throughout the entire process from cells to modules and PACKs. While ensuring product quality, it improves production efficiency, reduces errors and downtime caused by various factors, significantly lowers production costs for customers, and enhances overall economic benefits.
From digital twins to pneumatic control, from heavy-duty robots to collaborative robots, and from 3D vision onward, intelligent manufacturing technology is deeply integrating along the chain of “virtual optimization – hardware execution – quality control,” driving the energy storage industry to accelerate toward high compatibility, low full life-cycle cost, and high safety.
Roundtable Discussion
Ecosystem Formation of the Industry
This roundtable forum focused on the integrated innovation of the energy storage industry and intelligent manufacturing. Moderated by Lead Intelligent, representatives from Siemens Digital Industries Software, FANUC Robotics, Festo, and Autowell discussed the technical challenges of large cells and cost-reduction and efficiency-improvement paths in depth. Regarding full life-cycle cost optimization and future development of large cells, the consensus among all parties is: taking intelligent manufacturing as an anchor point, connecting the entire chain of large-cell R&D, flexible production, and global services, and pushing the energy storage industry toward a critical point of qualitative change through technological innovation and process upgrades.
Currently, intelligent technologies represented by large models and embodied intelligence are deeply reconstructing the underlying logic of energy storage manufacturing. This forum, structured around the three progressive themes of “Breaking Technical Barriers – Intelligent Manufacturing Upgrade – Ecological Resonance,” explored the era-defining issues facing the energy storage industry, provided new ideas and insights for the further development of large-cell technology, and strongly promoted the key leap of China’s battery energy storage industry from “single innovation” to “system-level ecological competitiveness.”
