Did the mobile battery suddenly catch fire?
That seems to be the case at the moment. Outdoor camping tents seem to have become the second home for young people since 2020. According to the 2022 White Paper on the trend of Tmall's Taobao camping industry, China's camping has undergone a change from the traditional "hiking camping" to the "park camping" stage, and has changed to the "exquisite camping" stage from 2020. But from beginning to end, no matter at any stage, outdoor camping can not be separated from the support of relevant equipment, among which outdoor mobile power supply is particularly important.
Wang Lei, founder of Zhenghao Innovation, once said that outdoor power supply provides a more convenient way to use electricity, is cleaner and friendlier than traditional fuel generators, and has a higher performance-to-price ratio. Products that used to take 10-20 hours to be fully charged now only take 1-2 hours.
Surging market demand and their own high-quality performance, so that mobile batteries on the ecommerce platform was "looted."
In the first 10 minutes of this year's 618 campaign, JD.com 's outdoor power turnover rose 57-fold from a year earlier, and the number of brands introduced rose from 20 to 40, according to official figures. In June, the shipment of outdoor power supply reached 6 million, of which 4000 yuan to 8000 yuan of high-grade outdoor power sales are the best.
The good prospect of mobile batteries is also reflected in the huge market scale. According to the 2022-2027 Mobile Power Industry Market Research and Investment Strategy recommendation report, the global mobile power market size reached 29.16 billion yuan in 2021, an increase of 6.8 percent over the same period last year. In the same year, the scale of China's mobile power supply market reached 44.16 billion yuan, an increase of 10.7 percent over the same period last year.
In CCTV Finance's report on outdoor mobile power supply, an ecommerce platform 3C digital accessories industry head said that the compound growth rate of outdoor mobile power supply in three years has exceeded 300%. When the mobile battery "cake" gradually expands, the market demand suddenly increases, naturally attracts many entrants, already dormant in it the enterprise must have to face the new impact.
So is the "fire" of the mobile battery empty? How will the competition pattern of the industry "reshuffle"? Who is the biggest beneficiary? What are the core pain points of the track in order to master the final voice? It's all "new and old players" that need to think about.
Re-energized shared charging treasure manufacturers
China is the main producer of global Portable Energy Storage products. Relevant research data show that in 2020, China's portable energy storage products accounted for 91.9% of the world, and although the United States and Japan ranked second and third respectively, the gap between them and China is obvious.
It is worth noting that the world's top five portable energy storage equipment manufacturers are in China, and some power peripheral product manufacturers have gradually used their own advantages to fight outdoor mobile power circuit. According to the data of Tianyan, there are 1,776 enterprises related to the business of "portable energy storage power supply." Among them, 1,644 were registered between January 1 and July 25, 2022.
Among the many "transferred" enterprises, there are many shared charging treasure industry background enterprises, such as electric small two, Yu Bo, product wins and so on. The reason is that in addition to the surging blue ocean of mobile batteries, the shared charging treasure industry has already become the Red Sea.
In recent years, sharing charging treasure enterprises have been plagued by problems, of which the difficulty of profitability is the most troublesome.
Zhuoyuan Capital CEO Lin Haizhuo also bluntly said to Europe billion, sharing charging treasure enterprise gross profit is very thin, and even most of the product life is not more than 18 months.
And indeed it is. The "2020 Shared Charging Treasure Research Report" mentioned that in the direct mode, the gross profit rate of shared charging treasure can reach at least 24.85%. Among the various costs, the equipment cost is only 15.4%, and the merchant cost accounts for the most, nearly 48%. In short, half of the money earned by shared charging treasure companies is siphoned off by merchants.
In addition, a group of data from the China Chemical and Physical Power Supply Industry Association shows that the total user growth rate of Dianbao has fallen from 104.9% in 2018 to 15.6% in 2020. See this tragedy, sharing charging treasure manufacturers have "fled," looking for new growth in order to save themselves.
All along, they have made a lot of attempts, but "play well, mixed miserably," whether it is selling liquor, engaging in short videos, or playing smart hardware, eventually ended in failure.
For example, the monster charging to sell liquor has lost money for three consecutive quarters, According to the financial report, Monster Charging lost 79.4 million yuan in the third quarter of 2021, lost 68.5 million yuan in fourth quarter, and lost 96.4 million yuan in first quarter 2022. Small electric technology to engage in short video in 2021 after the submission of the IPO prospectus has not been successful, and according to the relevant media coverage, small electric is expected to lay off 2,000 people, about 40% of the total number of the company.
Even if many of the shared charging treasure manufacturers in transition are stuck in the quagmire, there are always pioneers who take the lead.
Take Warburg Xinneng as an example, the company started in the early stage with the shared charging treasure ODM business, In 2015, it began to lay out the outdoor energy storage market, and created its own brand Electric Power Two, which has now become one of the largest portable energy storage equipment manufacturers in the world.
Baoxineng's business transformation has also ushered in year-on-year growth in revenue. According to the financial report, in 2019, 2020 and 2021, Warburg New Energy's operating revenue was 319 million yuan, 1.07 billion yuan and 2.315 billion yuan respectively, and its net profit was 36.4516 million yuan, 234 million yuan and 280 million yuan respectively. In 2015, Warburg New Energy's revenue was 143 million yuan, which increased 16 times in 6 years.
When the "old shared charging treasure manufacturers" represented by Warburg New Energy earn a lot, Naturally, it will attract much attention, but due to the hot energy storage track branch, row upon row of players entering, Ningde era, Anke, Huawei, Bull, Newman, etc. have similar product types to Warburg Xinneng.
In other words, the "old shared charging treasure manufacturers" are facing fierce market competition, "Huabao new energy" in the end how much strength to deal with the "thousands of horses" behind?
The difficulty is not to beat the opponent, but to get the industry itself.
The mobile battery track is a bit crowded at the moment.
Throughout the industry, today's mobile battery companies in addition to sharing the charging treasure industry origin, there are also 3C digital accessories companies. In recent years, these companies have achieved mass shipments of products by actively expanding their outdoor power supply product lines and have also occupied a certain share in emerging markets.
In addition, manufacturers of new energy resources and energy storage business are also participating, such as Ningde Times, Xinwanda, Panneng Technology, Penghui Power Supply, etc.
However, the energy storage business is mainly divided into grid side energy storage, household energy storage and portable energy storage. Portable energy storage is mostly the business derived from the above manufacturers, "grid side energy storage" is mainly for B-end users, "Household energy storage and portable energy storage" is mainly for C-end users, and at present, these companies have a relatively high proportion of ToB business, and portable storage is in the early stages of development.
In this regard, portable energy storage manufacturer Zhenghao innovation EcoFlow China market leader Wang Fang told billion Europe, the current mobile battery track business can be roughly divided into focus on outdoor power or related ecological manufacturers; Share charging treasure, digital accessories category expansion or transformation of manufacturers; Industry manufacturers who dabble and expand categories.
Wang Fang said that the advantage of sharing charging treasure products is that there is a certain supply chain foundation. The main difference between "outdoor power" and shared charging treasure is the inverter, but the overlap of components such as batteries, electronic components, integrated circuits, and structural equipment is higher.
It is worth noting that the entry of so many new enterprises is related to the low threshold of industry entry. The outdoor power supply is composed of "battery + protection circuit, output circuit board, AC charging circuit plate, inverter, photovoltaic charging plate" and other equipment, Enterprises need to purchase raw materials for these components upstream, such as batteries, Solar Panels, inverters, electronic components, structural parts, etc., and then carry out corresponding production and processing.
Such a simple production process, for manufacturers with experience in power products, is familiar with the cost and core technology issues.
First, the cost aspect. Outdoor power supplies mainly include battery systems and inverter systems, and their material costs account for more than 50%, of which the cost of batteries, inverters and electronic components exceeds 75%. According to the financial report, Warburg New Energy's business revenue of portable energy storage was 1.835 billion yuan in 2021, and its raw material cost reached 926 million yuan.
In addition, the price fluctuation of the lithium battery industry has a greater impact on the cost of portable energy storage equipment.
Relevant data show that the average price of lithium-ion battery packs globally in 2019 was $156 / kWh, down 87% from 2010. As lithium prices begin to recover in 2020, the growth rate of the portable energy storage industry has dropped from 200% to 100% from the peak in 2021.
Industry sources said that from 2021 to the first quarter of 2022, the increase in the cost of some batteries is close to doubling. Experts at ThirdBridge High Pro Consulting believe that from the first quarter sales data of portable energy storage equipment, the growth rate in the first half of this year may fall to about 50%, and the overall growth rate from 2021 to 2022 may slow to about 70%.
Portable energy storage manufacturers also face the problem of battery competition. In 2021, the market size of China's new energy automobile industry alone was 452.9 billion yuan, up 158.8 percent year on year, according to data from China Research Institute of Industry. Compared with portable energy storage, it is a very small market, and the discourse power of upstream manufacturers is weak.
In terms of technology, outdoor power supply is most valued, battery capacity, maximum power, charging and battery life time, size, charge and discharge times, battery safety and other factors. But most of the manufacturers of research and development, mainly concentrated in the shape and structure, on the battery, inverter and other technologies R & D is very few.
According to Tianyan data, as of July 25, the number of patents of Huabao Xinneng Company totaled 258, of which 191 were about shape and practical patents; The number of patents of Zhenghao Innovation Company is 295, with 262 patents on form and utility. According to the financial report, in 2021, the total revenue of Warburg New Energy was 2.315 billion yuan, the relevant R & D expenses were only 64 million yuan, and the sales expenses were 565 million yuan, accounting for 30.8% of the "outdoor power" revenue.
Mobile battery-related technology research and development is difficult, long cycle, and high cost, for the main outdoor power supply business manufacturers, obviously some too "stir up trouble." Relevant industry sources said that when the outdoor power supply is more than 2kwh, the product will also have a certain technical threshold in the production of PCS, batteries, power modules, etc., and the safety of products will also be higher.
Obviously, this will bring no small pressure to enterprises without relevant technology accumulation.
Epilogue
At present, the mainstream energy storage products below 500Wh have a relatively low entry threshold, and the quality requirements for lithium batteries are not high, so the market competition is fierce. In the future, how to improve the storage capacity and charging efficiency while ensuring portability and safety will be the key problem for portable energy storage manufacturers to overcome in subsequent research and development.
In addition, according to Lin's observation, the main challenge for mobile battery manufacturers is whether the batteries are self-supplied. [For pure assembly plants, the living space in the future will be smaller and smaller. Enterprises with batteries, batteries, and BMS self-supply will have stronger gross profit space, and will be less affected by upstream raw materials and transportation problems caused by the epidemic, and have stronger anti-cycle ability. " Lin Hydra said.
In short, eat the market dividend first, and then fight product competitiveness. Those enterprises with technical advantages, brand advantages and channel advantages will take more market opportunities, and low-end production capacity will be eliminated.
