What are the big challenges in the power lithium battery market?

Recently, the state's policy of encouraging individuals to purchase new energy vehicles is about to emerge, which has caused the already hot new energy car related industries to heat up again. In this regard, experts said that even with car purchase subsidies, the market acceptance of new energy vehicles, especially hybrid and pure electric vehicles, also requires a certain amount of time to "pre-heat", but, the new energy vehicle supporting industry, In particular, power lithium-ion batteries(hereinafter referred to as lithium-ion batteries) have shown a trend of overcapacity worldwide.

According to Frost &;; Experts from Sullivan Consulting said that as the core component of the power drive power assembly, lithium batteries account for 50 % to 70 % of the cost of the power assembly. Lithium-ion batteries will be one of the biggest beneficiaries of the new energy car market, which is the main driving force behind the concentration of capital on lithium-ion batteries. Last September, Foshan Lighting invested 29.23 million yuan to set up a joint venture company in Qinghai to produce lithium carbonate, a raw material for lithium batteries, and plans to put lithium batteries into production in the future. At the end of the same year, the shareholders of Shanghai Aerospace Industry Corporation, Shanghai Space Power Research Institute, Ningbo Sugiyama Co., Ltd. and Shenzhen Dazu Laser Technology Co., Ltd. signed an agreement in Shanghai to launch the first investment of 90 million yuan in Shanghai. The industrialization project of new energy automotive power batteries will form an annual production capacity of 100 million angstroms of lithium batteries. In January, Hong Kong's rich Li Ka-shing also formally entered the field of electric vehicles and lithium batteries through the acquisition of Leitian. At the same time, Wan Xiang, lithium source, BYD and other companies are still promoting production capacity expansion plans.

So far, the capacity of the Chinese power lithium battery industry is about 2 billion angstroms, which is mainly distributed in the Pearl River Delta, the Yangtze River Delta, the three eastern provinces, and the Beijing-Tianjin-Tang auto industry agglomeration area, of which the capacity of the Pearl River Delta is 700 million angstroms. The capacity of the Yangtze River Delta, the three eastern provinces, and the Beijing-Tianjin-Tang Dynasty are all 300 million to 400 million hours. Frost &; Sullivan, a consultancy, reckons that China's power lithium battery capacity will reach 3.9 billion angstroms by 2015, driven by heavy capital. In 2015, China's demand for pure electric vehicles(EV), plug-in hybrid vehicles(PHEV) and electric commercial vehicles was about 120,000, and when it needed to consume about 900 million lithium batteries, it accounted for only 23 of the current year's production capacity.

While many lithium battery projects in China are advancing rapidly, most of these local companies are "friendless" -- they have no experience in the automotive industry and have no capital relationship with mainstream carmakers, industry experts said. It will not only face the pressure of overcapacity, but also face the pressure of foreign lithium-ion battery giants. The expert believes that unlike the "solo music" of local lithium batteries, the international brand lithium battery companies are more inclined to adopt the market strategy of "public music" with mainstream automotive manufacturers, namely through joint ventures or supply agreements. Get a solid supporting market.

Frost &; Almost all of the world's mainstream lithium-ion battery companies have landed in China, according to a study by Sullivan Consulting. Among them, the United States A123 Systems entered the Shanghai Automobile Supply System by means of a joint venture. In December, Shanghai Automobile and the United States A123 Systems jointly established Shanghaijie New power battery System Co., Ltd. to jointly develop, produce and sell mobile power lithium batteries. The estimated total investment of the project is US$ 20 million. In the same period, South Korea's SK Energy, South Korea's LG Chemical, and Denmark's Lynx entered the supply system of Chinese vehicle factories such as Beiqi, Chang 'an and Geely from last year by means of a supply agreement.

In fact, the huge future of lithium-ion batteries is not only causing overcapacity in China, but is also largely the case in developed countries. While lithium battery makers are now highly sought after, Roland Berger said in a recently released consultancy entitled "power systems 2020, lithium-ion batteries -- the next bubble". Investment in this area will trigger serious overcapacity in 2014-2017, particularly in the United States and Japan. The report also notes that government subsidies will undoubtedly stimulate more investment. In contrast, most investments in developing countries are still concentrated in battery manufacturing(assembly) rather than in core materials. At the same time, in developing countries, it is still very scarce to truly meet the technology needs of vehicle manufacturers and have high-quality, large-scale production capacity and low-cost battery suppliers. Luolan·beige's experts stressed that "low-end manufacturing capacity is constantly repeating construction, and imitation and replication are constantly emerging. This is the status quo in the battery industry in developing countries. "

For many years, China has been using new-energy vehicles as a breakthrough point for the automotive industry to achieve leapfrogging development. However, when the door of the new-energy car market is about to open, China will not only take lithium batteries as an example in the supporting industry of new-energy vehicles, but also take them as a technical excuse. Moreover, the chronic problems of low-level recurrent construction and overcapacity have once again been staged. It can be seen that in order to win the first chance in the hot new energy car market, it is not only inseparable from the scientific planning and reasonable restraint of the government and industry management departments, but also requires the calm decision of the relevant enterprises.

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