Reporter | Lu Keyan
On November 22, the official website of the Shanghai Stock Exchange showed that the application for listing on the Science and Technology Innovation Board of Guangzhou Jifei Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Jifei Technology") has been accepted.
The IPO intends to raise 1.509 billion yuan, with Shenwan Hongyuan Securities as the sponsoring institution; the number of shares to be publicly issued shall not exceed 60.01 million shares, which shall not be less than 15% of the total share capital of the company after issuance.
Founded in 2012, Jifei Technology is an agricultural technology company headquartered in Guangzhou, whose main business includes R&D, manufacturing and sales of agricultural unmanned aerial vehicles, agricultural unmanned vehicles, agricultural machinery self-driving instruments, agricultural Internet of Things equipment, etc. Intelligent agricultural equipment and intelligent agricultural management systems.
Jifei Technology is still not profitable. According to the prospectus, the operating income of Jifei Technology in 2018, 2019, 2020 and January-June 2021 was 320 million yuan, 360 million yuan, 530 million yuan and 470 million yuan, respectively; the net loss was 6.89 million yuan, 39.6 million yuan, 59.83 million yuan and 85.55 million yuan, respectively; after deducting non-recurring gains and losses, the net loss attributable to the owners of the parent company was 19.28 million yuan, 49.58 million yuan, 71.46 million yuan and 100 million yuan, respectively.
The prospectus writes that the company has not yet made a profit and there is an unrepaired loss, mainly because the company's industry is still in a period of rapid growth, the current stage of research and development investment is high, the new product line is still in the market promotion stage and the sales scale effect has not yet been reflected. For a certain period of time in the future, the company may continue to lose money or will not be able to distribute profits.
From 2018 to 2020, the comprehensive gross profit margin of Jifei Technology was 32.54%, 32.74% and 35.60% respectively; from January to June 2021, the comprehensive gross profit margin was 22.11%, and the decline increased. Jifei Technology explained that the reason for the decline was the reduction of the sales price of some new products, and some sales orders were lost due to the inability to supply in time, and the expected scale effect and cost reduction effect were not realized. In addition, the sharp rise in global commodity prices in the first half of 2021 has also increased the cost of important parts such as the company's motors.
In addition, the overall gross profit margin of Jifei Technology is much lower than the average of comparable companies, and Jifei Technology explains that it is mainly because the company mainly adopts the mode of distribution and direct sales as the supplement, giving dealers 20%-30% of the profit margin, and the dealers are mainly responsible for regional market development and daily maintenance of channels.
Jifei is the first company in the industry to realize a number of innovative technologies for agricultural drones, and DJI is its main opponent in this field. In the agricultural drone industry, the advantage of Jifei Technology lies in the perfect distribution system and technology research and development strength, but compared with core competitors such as DJI, the supply chain bargaining power that Jifei can form at this stage of production and sales scale is relatively insufficient.
In the past three years, the R&D investment of Jifei Technology has been continuously improved. The company's R&D investment in 2018, 2019, 2020 and January to June 2021 was 48.85 million yuan, 69.47 million yuan, 97.35 million yuan and 81.3 million yuan, accounting for 15.18%, 19.49%, 18.36% and 17.35% of the operating income, respectively.
The prospectus mentions that the funds raised from the offering will be used for projects related to the company's main business, including the digital agriculture intelligent manufacturing base project, the construction of Guangzhou R&D center, and the construction of marketing and service system.
In terms of equity structure, the current largest shareholder of Jifei Technology is Peng Bin, the chairman of the company, holding 29.13% of the shares, which is the controlling shareholder and actual controller of the company, followed by Hong Kong Jifei, Xiamen Extreme, SVF FLY and Baishan Investment, holding 14.03%, 14.01%, 12.91% and 6.15% respectively.