Under the new infrastructure of 5G, the market for multiple lithium battery segments is welcoming \"Blue Ocean \"

Entering 2020, the competition for various battery technologies is constantly escalating. But it is undeniable that lithium battery technology will be difficult to be subverted for a long time in the future.

This year ’s government work report highlights the need to strengthen the construction of new infrastructure, develop a new generation of information networks, expand 5G applications, build charging piles, promote new energy vehicles, stimulate new consumer demand, and help industrial upgrading.

As we all know, \"building charging piles \" and \"promoting new energy vehicles \" are inseparable from the development of the lithium battery industry. In fact, \"expanding 5G applications \" will also accelerate the penetration of lithium battery applications, expand investment scale, and drive new New opportunities for consumption.

\"Expanding 5G applications will bring high-speed growth to the lithium battery industry and will further expand the scope of application of lithium batteries. The market demand for lithium batteries will increase dramatically. \" Tang Yougen, director of the Institute of Chemical Power and Materials, Central South University Said: First, 5G applications will promote the development of social electrification and intelligence, 5G communications and large-scale mobile power and decentralized energy storage will grow rapidly, and energy storage lithium-ion batteries will have new increments; second, 5G applications will accelerate The development of smart cars promotes the large-scale popularization of electric vehicles and directly drives the market demand for power batteries. Finally, 5G applications will further develop consumer electronics products such as mobile phones, computers, household appliances, and consumer lithium-ion batteries will usher in new A round of growth. At the same time, 5G applications will also promote the rapid development of smart homes, smart communities, smart social services and various mobile robots. The demand for supporting lithium batteries will increase substantially.

Lithium battery for 5G communication and energy storage

At present, many countries around the world are accelerating 5G commercial use, and 5G base stations and other \"new infrastructure \" capital investment continues to heat up: China Mobile ’s capital expenditures in 2020 are landing, of which 5G-related capital expenditures are about 100 billion, accounting for 55.6%; Of the estimated annual capital expenditures, 17.8 billion out of a total of 28 billion is 5G-related capital expenditures. Guosen Securities expects 5G construction to be launched on a large scale in 2020, reaching its peak in 2021-2023 and gradually maturing in 2024-2025.

\"Now, we roughly add more than 10,000 5G base stations every week. In April, 5G users increased by more than 7 million a month, more than 36 million. Cumulatively, on May 25, the Minister of Industry and Information Technology Miao Wei revealed in an interview via online video that since this year, it has accelerated the construction of 5G.

On May 19, Gan Bin, vice president of Huawei's wireless product line, also stated at Huawei's 17th Global Analyst Conference that 200,000 stations of 5G base stations have been completed nationwide, and 800,000 stations of 5G base stations are expected to be completed by the end of this year , Covering more than 340 cities across the country.

With the accelerated construction of 5G base stations, the market for lithium batteries for 5G communications is also ushering in a substantial increase. In 2020, the bidding for lithium iron phosphate battery pack products released by China Mobile and China Tower is close to 4GWh.

On April 27, China Mobile's 2020 centralized procurement project for lithium iron phosphate battery products for communications began. Zhongtian Technology, Haisida, Shuangdeng Group, Yiwei Lithium Energy, Nandu Power, Xiongtao Power, Coslight Power, Lilang Eight batteries won the bid.

On May 25th, China Tower announced the results of the selection of the intensive e-commerce procurement project for lithium iron phosphate battery pack products for power reserve in 2020. Shuangdeng Group, Nandu Power, Zhitai New Energy, Penghui Energy, Zhongtian Technology 5 companies Pre-winning.

The total amount of the above two lithium battery centralized procurement projects is expected to exceed 1.3 billion yuan. In addition, China Unicom and China Telecom have also announced that they will jointly gather no less than 250,000 5G base stations this year, and the lithium battery industry is expected to welcome another large order of more than 1 billion yuan.

5G Intelligent Connected Car Lithium Battery

At this year's National Two Conferences, several representatives such as Xu Heyi, Chairman of BAIC Group, Yin Tongyue, Chairman of Chery Automobile, Chen Hong, Chairman of SAIC Group, and Zhang Xinghai, Chairman of Xiaokang Automobile, all proposed the development of 5G technology and intelligent connected automotive industry.

On April 24, Huawei joined forces with FAW Group (FAW Hongqi, FAW Pentium, FAW Liberation), Changan Automobile, Dongfeng Group (Dongfeng Passenger Vehicle, Dongfeng Xiaokang), SAIC Group (SAIC Passenger Vehicle, SAIC-GM-Wuling), GAC Group (GAC New Energy), BAIC Group (BAIC New Energy), BYD, Great Wall Motors, Chery Holdings, JAC, Yutong (passenger cars), Cyrus, Nanjing Iveco, T3 Travel, etc., the first batch of 18 car companies, officially established \"5G Automotive Ecosystem \".

In mid-April, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the\"Key Points for the Standardization of Intelligent Connected Vehicles in 2020\", which gave instructions on the standardization and phased tasks of intelligent connected vehicles in my country. The main points of work point out that 2020 is the year of completion of the goal of the first stage of the construction of the intelligent connected vehicle standard system, and also the year of the layout of the next stage of work.

Prior to this, many domestic auto companies such as SAIC Roewe, GAC New Energy, Great Wall Motors, Xinbaojun, Weimar Automobile, etc. have already deployed in the field of 5G intelligent connected cars. Governments and car companies around the world have also started to set up 5G smart connected car demonstration areas and built 5G smart connected car demonstration lines.

The battery network noted that from the perspective of the layout of car companies, the currently exposed 5G intelligent connected car production models are all new energy vehicles. As a key year for the outbreak of 5G vehicles, a number of production models will be launched this year.

In addition, the recently released\"IDC Global Intelligent Connected Vehicle Forecast Report\" shows that the number of vehicles that can connect to third-party service platforms and global intelligent connected vehicles equipped with embedded mobile networks reached 51.1 million in 2019. This is an increase of 45.4% compared to 2018. IDC predicts that by 2023, global shipments of connected cars will further increase to 76.3 million units, with an annual growth rate of 9.3%.

At this stage, the development and application of intelligent connected vehicles is still in its infancy, but with the growth of 5G smart electric vehicle shipments, the market demand for lithium-power batteries will also expand.

Lithium batteries for consumer electronics and smart home products

Research institute Markets and Markets released a report saying that the global lithium-ion battery market demand will reach 44.2 billion US dollars this year, and will increase to 94.4 billion US dollars by 2025, during which the compound annual growth rate will reach 16.4%. In terms of capacity range, 3,000–10,000mAh is expected to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period, especially in industries such as consumer electronics, electric vehicles, aviation, defense, and power tools. The growing market for consumer electronics and smartphones has a growing demand for high-power batteries. These batteries can keep the device running for a long time. At the same time, due to the large screen and backup power supply, it can provide the best device experience.

According to data released by research institute EVTank, shipments of small-scale lithium-ion batteries in 2019 were 46.5Gwh, a year-on-year increase of 23.3%, mainly due to the rapid growth of lithium batteries for power tools, electric bicycles, vacuum cleaners and other fields in 2019 speed. In addition, the growth of smartphones, especially 5G smartphones, has also driven the growth of small lithium-ion battery shipments.

In terms of enterprises, in 2019, Xinwanda consumer lithium batteries achieved revenue of 18.546 billion yuan, an increase of 24.27% year-on-year in 2018; Desai Battery achieved revenue of 18.443 billion yuan in 2019, an increase of 6.92% year-on-year. Consumer electronics lithium battery related products account for about 90%.

In 2020, with the advent of the 5G era, the demand for consumer electronics and smart home products has become higher and higher, the volume requirements are getting smaller and smaller, the service life is getting longer, the battery technology upgrades, product replacement, and market expansion Many other aspects will also speed up.

However, although the market prospects of the above lithium battery applications are promising under the wind of 5G new infrastructure, in the initial stage, market expansion is not easy.

For example, the above mentioned China Mobile's centralized procurement project for lithium iron phosphate battery products for communications in 2020. Among the successful bidders, the lowest bid price is about 0.66 yuan / Wh and the highest is about 0.74 yuan / Wh. For such a price, many industry insiders said the price was much lower than expected.

\"Some lithium battery products won the bid at ultra-low prices. On the one hand, due to technological advances, the cost of the battery has been reduced. On the other hand, the company ’s marketing strategy. \" Tang Yougen also believes that \"market behavior without profit is unsustainable. The market norms will enable battery companies to return to normal development. The market prospects of 5G communication lithium-ion batteries are promising, but domestic lithium battery production capacity is huge, and competition is inevitable. \"

\"0.66 yuan / wh = 2.112 yuan / Ah, the cost price of lithium iron phosphate positive electrode + graphite negative electrode + electrolyte + current collector + shell accessories and other battery materials may not only be 0.66 yuan / wh, plus labor, hydropower, depreciation , I do n’t think it ’s necessary to make any calculations. In general, it does n’t make money. \"In the view of Wang Qingsheng, the president of the China-Russia Institute of New Energy Materials Technology, low-price competition is one of the main reasons why the quality and performance of batteries cannot be improved. .

Wang Qingsheng believes that the market and products covered by the 5G market must ultimately be supported by performance and product technology. The market will still be subdivided, providing portable digital, smart home, remote control, unmanned driving, driving equipment, base station backup, etc. The field brings new market space, but it also puts forward higher requirements on battery performance and function.

\"Product positioning pricing in different market segments is also different, and it will not win the right to speak in the market only by price. \" Wang Qingsheng said that high safety, high magnification, high capacity, long life, small size, wide temperature all-round More attention is paid to the common problems of the battery industry, and the market capacity of high-quality batteries is still relatively large.

Wang Qingsheng further exemplified that the future development of 5G intelligent network will bring high speed, precision and personalization in intelligent control, face recognition, intelligent avoidance, unmanned driving, and network services, which will drive the development of new energy vehicles. Trends, but whether it is 5G intelligent connected cars or today's electric cars, lithium battery functions, performance, and safety are the same or even higher requirements. \"Whether it has more impact on the promotion of the new energy vehicle market depends on the application performance of the 5G market products and the acceptance of the public. It may not be like it, because too cumbersome manipulation is not a favorite of the middle-aged and elderly; In addition, whether the stability and safety of the connected car (referring to the safety of network space excluding battery safety) will also limit the choices of some people; the price problem, according to the design of the 5G network should be higher than the current electric How about the price of cars? How much purchasing power does the working-class and young people have today? Where is the market group of 5G smart connected cars? How much growth can 5G connected cars bring to the lithium battery market? We will wait and see. \"

Conclusion:Although the overall market for lithium batteries is \"Red Sea \", but in many market segments, it is still \"Blue Sea \". Enterprises are exploring new markets to find new profitable growth points. With the continuous expansion of the 5G market capacity, more and more battery industry chain companies will enter. If they are at the beginning of the market cultivation, they will\"pay for the loss\" Relying on a low-price strategy to enter the market, the market will fall into a price war before the market rises, the blue ocean will become the red ocean, and the entire industry chain will be frustrated.