Volkswagen Group laid out large plans on Monday to cross Tesla and changing into the world’s largest maker of electrical automobiles.

“Let me start with the apparent: e-mobility has received the race,” VW Group CEO Herbert Diess said at the company’s Power Day event. “It’s the solely resolution to cut back mobility emissions quick.”

As a substitute of speaking about vehicles, design, or different customer-facing options, nonetheless, many of the occasion was spent concentrating on the center of electrical vehicles: the battery.

It is because batteries at present make up greater than 30 % of an EV’s value. And with each automaker trying to pivot to EVs, it is not nearly getting batteries on the least expensive worth potential but additionally securing sufficient provide to fulfill these ambitions.

The pivot won’t be low cost. VW introduced it plans to construct six battery factories across Europe by 2030, which BloombergNEF estimates would value about $29 billion.

The automaker can be making investments in unifying the design of its battery and in recycling treasured metals.

And but, VW will discover it laborious to beat Elon Musk.

“Tesla will doubtless keep its broad EV management,” Ben Kallo, an analyst at Robert W. Baird, wrote in a report. Even after VW’s hours-long presentation Baird nonetheless sees Tesla as having the higher hand with regard to batteries.

Venkat Viswanathan, an affiliate professor at Carnegie Mellon College and an EV professional, additionally thinks Tesla’s drivetrains comprising each batteries and electrical motors are 4 or 5 years forward of the competitors. They provide “the best driving vary for a similar battery capability,” he stated.

Baird’s Kallo offers VW’s ambitions excessive marks — he’s simply not satisfied Musk will cede pole place. “We view Volkswagen as a possible chief within the ‘non-Tesla’ portion of the EV market,” Kallo wrote. “A non-Tesla EV ecosystem will emerge, much like the non-Apple ecosystem in smartphones (i.e., Android).”

Apple constructed an ecosystem that integrates {hardware} improvements comparable to processing chips and digicam sensors with software program lock-ins just like the iOS working system and the App Retailer. It could have irritated many customers, however Apple has caught with its proprietary lightning charging cable.

Tesla has carried out one thing very comparable with EVs by creating its personal battery chemistry, electrical motors and driver-assistance system. It has additionally constructed a supercharging community different vehicles can not use (a minimum of not but).

Google’s Android working system and Samsung Electronics managed to carve out a major share of the worldwide smartphone market, however Apple turned the world’s most precious firm by constructing a dominant model and ecosystem for which customers are keen to pay far more.

The conclusion Baird’s Kallo reached Monday is much like one UBS analyst Patrick Hummel got here to after his workforce accomplished a teardown of VW’s ID3. “VW may not be the Apple, however the Samsung of the EV world,” he stated earlier this month.

Identical to Samsung has an edge over Apple with its superior smartphone show, there’s one space the place VW could also be forward of Tesla. VW has positioned a giant wager on next-generation lithium ion batteries.

In 2012, VW invested in Silicon Valley startup QuantumScape, which was constructing solid-state batteries that promised to extend driving vary by as a lot as 50 % and scale back charging occasions to fifteen minutes. Although QuantumScape’s battery won’t be in a automotive earlier than 2025, the corporate’s market worth stands at about $23 billion–roughly a sixth of VW’s valuation.

Whereas Tesla has many battery improvements below its belt, from novel chemistry to extra environment friendly manufacturing strategies, it has not stated something about creating solid-state batteries.