Strong demand for lithium-ion battery growth stabilized in the second half of the year

"In the first half of 2014, driven by the rapid growth in the production of electric vehicles, China's lithium-ion battery industry maintained a steady growth momentum. In the first half of this year, the output was close to 2.2 billion, and the lithium-ion battery import and export surplus reached 670 million U.S. dollars, an increase of nearly 10% year-on-year. % and 40%.” Yu Xuesong, a researcher at the SIDI think tank of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said at the 2014 China Electronic Information Industry Forum recently held that in the second half of the year, under the stimulation of policies, China’s electric vehicle production will maintain its rapid growth. The demand for power-type lithium-ion batteries will increase rapidly, while the gradual increase in the capacity of single-cell batteries will promote the steady growth of the consumer-type lithium-ion battery market.

At the conference, a report on "China's lithium-ion battery industry in the first half of the situation analysis and second half of the year situation assessment" was released. The report predicts that China's lithium-ion battery production will reach 5.5 billion, the annual growth rate of about 15%, but the industry competition There is a further increased risk.

Market grows steadily

In February, four ministries announced the list of the second batch of demonstration cities for new energy vehicles, and at the same time reduced the rate of subsidies for electric vehicles. Various pilot cities have issued detailed implementation rules and a series of policies have been introduced one after another, which has greatly stimulated the electric vehicle market in China.

The report shows that from January to May, China's electric vehicle production reached 14,290 vehicles, an increase of more than 150% year-on-year. The huge increase in the output of electric vehicles drove the rapid growth of power lithium production and became the main driving force for the continued growth of the lithium-ion battery industry. From January to May, the demand for lithium power for electric vehicles only reached 380MWh, an increase of nearly 180% from the same period last year. The Sadie think tank is expected that in 2014 China's electric vehicle production is expected to exceed 50,000, an increase of up to 150%, driving the demand for lithium-ion battery surged to 1290MW, an increase of nearly 200%.

As China has increased the technical support for lithium-ion batteries, China has gradually formed an innovation system integrating production, education and research. In the first half of 2014, breakthroughs in lithium-ion battery key technologies began to accelerate, and the industrialization process continued to accelerate. In terms of cathode materials, Tianjin University successfully developed high specific energy fluorinated graphene lithium battery cathode materials, and Jieshen developed a water-soluble cathode slurry dispersant that will reduce the cost of lithium-ion battery production. In terms of diaphragms, the first wet diaphragm production line in Liyang, Hunan, and Nanyang New Lithium Battery separator are expected to be put into operation in the fourth quarter.

At the same time, under the stimulation of national policies, the development of lithium-ion batteries in China began to accelerate, and some companies began to become active in order to improve the industrial chain, increase market competitiveness, and increase capital operations. The first is to open up the entire industrial chain and achieve upstream and downstream integration. More typical of A123 and Fisco, which have successively acquired the United States, built the entire industry chain of electric vehicles. The second is to expand the scale and enhance the market position. The most prominent is that Tianqi Lithium intends to acquire Galaxy Lithium and Tellison's equity. The third is to take advantage of the layout, involved in the lithium-ion battery industry, such as Xinke materials 120 million yuan shares Tianjin Li Shen to enter lithium.

In addition, industry leading companies have accelerated the pace of transformation. Tianjin Lishen intends to invest 6 billion yuan to build lithium-ion power projects in Wuhan, and Suzhou and Qingdao power lithium-ion projects will start. Enterprises in other fields also began to engage in lithium power. Ruiheng Group announced that it will invest 10 billion yuan in the construction of a power lithium battery base in cooperation with China Shenzhou Judian and China Huaxia. Multinational companies increase their efforts in layout. Samsung SDI plans to invest 600 million U.S. dollars in Xi’an to build China’s largest power battery base.

According to the report, in the first half of 2014, China’s mobile intelligent terminal manufacturers released hundreds of new products. From the published parameters, the lithium-ion battery capacity used is gradually increasing. In 2014, the output of lithium-ion battery applications (mobile phones, laptops, digital cameras, etc.) in China will continue to grow at a low rate. On the whole, China's consumer lithium-ion battery market will maintain a steady growth. In 2014, China's lithium-ion battery production is expected to reach 5.5 billion.

It is worth mentioning that from the situation in the first half of the year, as China has increased its input in key materials and technologies such as separators, lithium hexafluorophosphate, power management systems, power battery groups, etc., domestic materials and lithium-ion battery The process of industrialization has been speeding up, and at the same time as the production cost has been reduced, the domestic matching capacity of lithium-ion batteries has been continuously improved and the international competitiveness of China's lithium-ion battery industry has been enhanced. It is estimated that in 2014 China's cathode material can basically meet the needs of the domestic market, the self-sufficient rate of lithium hexafluorophosphate is expected to reach 40%, and the self-separation rate of the separator will reach 30%.

Multi-channel pressure relief

Obviously, due to supply and demand pressure, fierce market competition, and inconsistent standards, China's power battery market still faces enormous challenges in terms of the overall situation.

First, from the situation in the first half of 2014, both domestic and foreign companies are increasing their investment in lithium-ion batteries for power generation. At the same time, some existing companies are also expanding their production capacity. China's power lithium-ion power capacity will be further expanded and is expected to reach 2014. 2000MWh. Although the state attaches great importance to policy support, local governments are actively introducing measures to solve infrastructure construction problems and high prices. However, once the results of the promotion are not as expected, power lithium batteries will face greater supply and demand pressure.

Second, after entering 2014, due to expected better power battery market, lithium-ion battery prices have basically remained stable, but the market competition is still very fierce, and the profitability of Chinese enterprises has yet to be improved. Shenzhen BAK achieved revenue of $74.04 million in the first half of the 2014 fiscal year (October 1, 2013 to March 31, 2014), which represented a year-on-year decrease of more than 30%. Although the gross profit margin was positive, net profit was still at a loss. When Shengsheng Technology achieved operating revenue of RMB 120 million in the first quarter, although losses have narrowed, it is still as high as RMB 12 million.

Third, the power battery standards have not been unified. Although China introduced many standards for lithium-ion batteries in the first half of the year, such as the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the “Comprehensive Standardization Technical System for Lithium-Ion Batteries for Electric Bicycles”, which includes a total of 24 standard items, but overall, in terms of automotive power batteries, standards Not yet unified, so that the major companies have a wide range of products, different products basically can not be compatible. At the same time, due to the inconsistency of the charging standards, and each brand of charging piles adopts their own hardware and software systems, the charging of electric vehicles brings a relatively large potential safety hazard.

In response to the above issues, the Citi think-tank suggested that we must accelerate the issuance of industry regulatory conditions to ensure the healthy and orderly development of the industry. Comprehensively strengthen the lithium-ion battery industry management, organize relevant departments and industry agencies to jointly study and formulate "Lithium-ion battery industry access conditions", focusing on the establishment of industry access thresholds in terms of technological level, production scale, resource utilization, safety requirements, etc. Regulate industrial development, guide industrial rational distribution and resource integration, prevent blind expansion of production capacity and regional blind investment.

Adhere to the strategy of assisting and supporting the superior, combined with the establishment of industry access system, guide the tilt of resources such as finance, industry, finance, and land to key enterprises, and accelerate the formation of core competitiveness of the industry. Encourage key enterprises to expand the scale of high-quality production and operations through mergers and acquisitions, strong alliances, etc., guide enterprises to gather in new industrial industrial demonstration bases and other industrial parks, and strengthen the cooperation of various supporting links and battery manufacturers to achieve intensive development.

Emphasis on safety issues, establish and improve long-term safety mechanisms, strengthen production standard management and technological research and innovation, and reduce product risk factors from the source. Cooperate with related departments to strengthen supervision and inspection efforts, establish and improve long-term safety supervision mechanism. Accelerate the research and establish a lithium-ion battery product specification recycling and reuse system.