Robin Zeng

Robin Zeng Yuqun is the founder and chairman of Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL), the world's largest manufacturer of electric vehicle batteries. A visionary engineer and entrepreneur, Zeng recognized early that the transition to electric vehicles would require massive advances in battery technology, and he built CATL into the company that makes that transition possible. Today, CATL supplies batteries to nearly every major automaker in the world, including Tesla, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen, Toyota, and many others.

CATL's rise to dominance in the global battery market is one of the most remarkable industrial stories of the 21st century. Founded in 2011, the company grew from a startup to the world's largest EV battery maker in just over a decade, achieving a market share of approximately 35% of global EV battery installations. Zeng's relentless focus on innovation has produced breakthroughs in lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) chemistry, cell-to-pack technology, and sodium-ion batteries, keeping CATL at the technological frontier.

Under Zeng's leadership, CATL has expanded beyond automotive batteries into energy storage systems, which are essential for integrating renewable energy sources like solar and wind into the power grid. His vision of a comprehensive clean energy ecosystem — from electric vehicles to grid-scale storage — positions CATL as a central player in the global energy transition. Zeng's technical brilliance and entrepreneurial drive have made him one of the most important industrialists of his generation.

Robin Zeng Yuqun was born in 1968 in Ningde, Fujian Province, China. He studied engineering at Shanghai Jiao Tong University and earned a PhD in physics from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Zeng co-founded Amperex Technology Limited (ATL) in 1999, which became one of the world's largest lithium-ion battery makers for consumer electronics, supplying Apple and Samsung.