(Yicai Global) June 21 -- Contemporary Amperex Technology has refuted reports in the media that China’s biggest electric car battery maker is forcing its management to buy new energy vehicles from US car giant Tesla that cannot be sold on the open market due to defects, a company insider told Yicai Global yesterday.

CATL encourages employees to buy electric cars at discount prices from many of its automaker clients, the insider said. The policy has been in place for three years, is not mandatory and there are no quality issues with the vehicles, he added.

The comments follow a report by car industry media outlet Chedongtai on June 17 showing a CATL car park full of Tesla Model 3 vehicles, and saying that the price of this batch of vehicles was CNY199,000 (USD30,762), a 20 percent discount off the asking price.

The price of CNY199,000 is a special price for CATL employees, the insider said. But it is not the biggest discount they have received.

After the Chedongtai report came out, an anonymous CATL employee posted on the Quora-like platform Zhihu that California-based Tesla had returned this batch of cars to CATL, which is a supplier of lithium-ion batteries to Tesla, due to defective batteries. CATL had no choice but to instruct its staff members to buy these vehicles at a special price as the battery maker could not resell the cars, he said.

CATL has said that it plans to build a big battery manufacturing plant near Tesla’s gigafactory in Shanghai, with an eye to becoming the electric car giant’s largest battery supplier, according to recent reports.

Ningde, southeastern Fujian province-based CATL’s [SHE:300750] share price closed up 0.62 percent at CNY452.80 (USD70) today.

Editor: Kim Taylor