Describe the transformation of lithium ion batteries in Japan

Recently, in the "international second battery exhibition" held in Japan, SONY, GS yuasa, Panasonic (only fuel cell products) and other Japanese lithium battery giants were not present. Neither is Japan recognized strongest solid-state battery technology.

However, in the smart grid exhibition held at almost the same time, Japanese lithium electric enterprises have been presented one after another, and they have been playing a great role in smart grid, demand side dynamic response, digital power station, analog power plant (VPP) and other fields.

Where there is an anomaly, there is a devil. Industry insiders believe that the "evasiveness" of Japanese companies towards lithium battery exhibition actually reflects that Japanese companies have given up competing with China and South Korea in the existing battery products, and then moved to the system integration industry, completing the transition from products to services.

This shift is the external manifestation of the industrial development technology centralization (core components and system integration) in developed countries, but from a different perspective, it is also the helpless act of Japanese lithium battery enterprises losing ground in cost performance.

It is an indisputable fact that the international market share of Japanese lithium battery has been declining since 2005. In 2016, the global market share of Japanese lithium battery has dropped to about 15%, which is a shocking speed of decline.

In fact, since the lithium battery industry was born in Japan in 1991, its market and technology were almost monopolized by Japan until 2005, and Japanese lithium battery enterprises also obtained high profits. After 2005, with the spread of lithium battery technology to China and South Korea, the middle and low-end market was gradually nibbled by China and South Korea, the overall profit of Japan's lithium battery industry began to decline rapidly, and caused many enterprises to have business difficulties.

In response, Japanese materials and battery companies are investing in China to shift low-end production capacity, hoping to reduce operating costs. On the other hand, the Japanese lithium industry has carried out several mergers and acquisitions and restructuring, the number of battery companies reduced to about five or six.

However, the self-rectification of Japanese lithium battery enterprises has achieved little effect on the whole. In recent years, the decline of Japanese lithium battery industry has become more and more obvious and shows an irreversible trend. In this context, the battery product to power system integration, has become a compelling and only effective option.

From the perspective of the development of lithium battery technology, the transformation of the lithium battery industry in Japan actually means that the era of lithium battery with pure technology as the king has ended. At the same time, the "cost performance" starts to dominate the lithium battery industry. At this stage of the industry, there is often only one strategy left: kill your opponent with money, or be killed by your opponent with money.

This is the kind of capital that is starting to upend technology, as it has done in other industries, in a far more brutal and bloody scenario than lithium.

Take Samsung's DRAM counter attack as an example. In 1984, just after Samsung launched 64KDRAM, the price of memory plummeted from $4 per chip to 30 cents per chip, when Samsung's cost was $1.3 per chip. In other words, we're losing $1 per slice. By the end of 1986, the accumulated loss was 300 million us dollars, and the equity capital was totally deficient.

Until 1987, the United States initiated anti-dumping proceedings against Japanese semiconductor companies, the two sides reached an export restriction agreement. As a result, DRAM prices recovered, and Samsung rose to profitability. Squeezed by Korean manufacturers, the Japanese government had to integrate the DRAM operations of Hitachi, NEC and Mitsubishi to form a "national team", elpida, to seek confrontation.

Even so, the Japanese did not escape defeat. When the financial crisis hit in 2008, DRAM prices collapsed from $2.25 to $0.31. Even as manufacturers were reeling, Samsung made a jaw-dropping decision to spend all of its profits from the previous year on capacity expansion, deliberately widening the industry's losses.

Soon after, elpida collapsed and Samsung drove the Japanese out of business with a suicidal investment. In 1983, Samsung was five years behind Japan in key technology when it developed the 64KDRAM. At 256K, the gap with Japan was 2 years. At 1M, we're still a year behind.

"Low-level remanufacturing" may sound dismissive, but when it has the capacity to innovate on its own, its scale has the power to change the world. The story of Samsung's attack on Japan can be found in countless fields, but the protagonist is no longer Samsung, but industry giants like gree and Huawei.

Back to the lithium battery field, China's power battery production capacity will reach 150Gwh in 2018, which has far exceeded the existing demand. Even so, major battery companies are still expanding their production. The reason is that large-scale intelligent manufacturing is an important chip for power battery enterprises to reduce costs, stabilize the supply of high-quality products and crush rivals.

Globally, there are many companies that choose to "throw money at their rivals". Panasonic invested 100 billion yen to increase production in Japan, China and the United States, which have power battery production bases. That is almost exactly what happened when Hitachi, NEC and Mitsubishi formed a "national team", called elpida, to take on Samsung. It is seen as a last-ditch attempt to boost Japan's lithium batteries.

Of course, Panasonic may not be as erbida to fall, at least the current Panasonic in the lithium industry can afford the comments. But other Japanese lithium electricity enterprise is not so optimistic, second only to Panasonic AESC, has carved up by China in last year (behind for too complicated, and no redundancy), and other such as GS yuasa, Hitachi, Toshiba, former giant is struggling, can only stick to the "blue sky" technology: the industry from the product to technical services, research and development of new battery at the same time in order to make a comeback.

It is worth mentioning that in the field of new energy, not all products and services are helpless, because in the perspective of industrial development, service itself is a higher level of products.

It is understood that the fuel cell giant Ballard and the world's top automotive supplier Bosch and other international enterprises are shifting their business to power system integration services; Japanese car giant Toyota has also said publicly that it is transforming itself from a car company into a mobile mobility service company.

From this perspective, the transformation of Japanese lithium battery enterprises from products to services is not only a helpless act of losing the battle of cost performance, but also a necessary way of industrial sublimation. However, in the rapid expansion of lithium battery in China and South Korea under the waves, this "sublimation" brought by the halo can last long, really want to play a big question mark.

The page contains the contents of the machine translation.