CATL hires mining industry bigwig!

On April 7, an insider at CATL exclusively told a reporter from First Financial that the company has officially hired Chen Jinghe, founder of Zijin Mining and its former chairman, to serve as an advisor to its mining division. This move is intended to leverage his extensive industry experience and resource advantages to further expand the mineral supply chain business and reinforce barriers to upstream resource security.

It is reported that Chen Jinghe, 69 years old at the time, officially retired from Zijin Mining on January 1, 2026. As a benchmark figure in China’s mining industry, Chen Jinghe has been deeply involved in the mining sector for more than 40 years. He is the main discoverer, researcher, and development organizer of the Zijinshan gold-copper mine, and he is also a core driver behind Zijin Mining’s development from a local small mineral company into a global mining giant. With outstanding achievements in areas such as geological prospecting, mine development, industrial chain integration, and overseas expansion, he is acclaimed as “Li Siguang of non-ferrous metals” and the “King of Gold in China.” He not only holds a professor-level senior engineer title, but is also an expert enjoying special government allowances from the State Council. He has won multiple major honors, including the National Science and Technology Progress Award and the Li Siguang Geological Science Award (Field Award), among others, and has a broad resource network and significant industry influence in the global mining sector.

Looking back on his career, after Chen Jinghe graduated from Fuzhou University’s geology program in 1982, he threw himself into mineral exploration and development. In 1992, he voluntarily resigned from his “iron rice bowl” post and took over the Shanghang County Mineral Company that was then in a precarious condition (the predecessor of Zijin Mining). With bold innovation in heap leaching technology and a precise development strategy, he led the company to achieve leapfrog growth, ultimately building a mining layout covering more than 20 provinces and regions in China and 7 countries overseas, and leading the implementation of more than 40 mine acquisitions, helping Zijin Mining grow into a leading enterprise in China’s mining industry. In November 2025, due to age and family reasons, Chen Jinghe submitted a proposal to step down from his management role at Zijin Mining. The company plans to appoint him as a lifelong honorary chairman and senior advisor, which also shows his core value in the company’s development.

CATL’s decision to hire Chen Jinghe is underpinned by the company’s strategic consideration of securing upstream mineral resource support. As a global leader in the power battery industry, CATL has, in recent years, continued to face supply pressures for key mineral resources such as lithium, nickel, cobalt, and phosphorus. These resources are precisely the core raw materials for power battery production, directly affecting the company’s production stability and cost competitiveness. To solve this problem, the company has, through a variety of approaches including building operations itself, taking equity stakes, forming joint ventures, and acquisitions, laid out mineral resources worldwide. It has successively participated in multiple projects such as the lithium mica mine in Yichun, Jiangxi; the Lijiagou lithium mine in Sichuan; and nickel mines in Indonesia. At the same time, through taking equity stakes in Huayou Cobalt and acquisitions such as Canadian Millennium Lithium, it has gradually built a diversified mineral supply chain system.

Industry insiders analyze that Chen Jinghe’s joining will inject professional strength into CATL’s mineral supply chain layout. With his extensive experience in mineral resource exploration, project operations, risk control, and overseas resource integration, he is expected to help CATL optimize its resource layout strategy, improve the efficiency of upstream mineral resource acquisition and the quality of operations, and further strengthen the company’s core competitiveness in the power battery industry. At the same time, it will also promote deep integration between traditional mining and the new-energy lithium battery industry, helping the entire new-energy industry chain achieve coordinated upgrade.

As of now, CATL has not yet publicly disclosed the specific division of work for Chen Jinghe or the cooperation details. However, the move to hire a mining heavyweight has already sent a clear signal that the company intends to continue deepening its upstream resource layout. In the future, with Chen Jinghe’s assistance, CATL is expected to further improve its mineral supply chain layout and provide more stable resource support for the high-quality development of the global new energy vehicle industry.

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