Nio is actively developing the second-generation battery swap station and expects to start deploying it to the market in March or April this year, the Chinese EV maker's co-founder and president Qin Lihong said in a presentation Saturday.

The second-generation battery swap station will have four times the service capacity of the first-generation battery swap station and will enable automatic connection to the vehicle, Qin said at the 2021 China EV100 forum.

Users can start up with one touch on the vehicle's center screen, and the vehicle can automatically park into the battery swap station and automatically change the battery, he said.

This feature provides the possibility for Nio to bring the battery swap model to developed markets in Europe and the United States, he said.

At the Nio Day event on January 9, Nio unveiled its second-generation battery swap station, which it says can hold up to 13 batteries and provide up to 312 services in a single day.

The second-generation battery swap station occupies four parking spaces and allows vehicles to be parked automatically without the user having to get out of the car, and the battery swap can be activated at the touch of a button inside the car.

This also means that vehicle battery swap times will be significantly reduced, helping to alleviate the problem of queues at battery swap stations as Nio's ownership continues to grow.

Nio plans to increase the total number of battery swap stations to 500 by the end of 2021.

Nio currently has 178 battery swap stations. In addition, Nio has 100 supercharging stations and 792 supercharging piles.

(Source: cnEVpost)