In the office of Zeng Yuqun, chairman of the Ningde times, there are two words, the entrance door is "strong gambling", and behind the desk, it is "Pu Bo yuanquan".
These eight words are related to courage and wisdom, and are also the business philosophy of Zeng Yuqun.
CATL was established in 2011 and successfully listed in June 2018. In just over three years, the stock price has increased nearly 30 times. The new "stock king" Ningde era is like a "printing machine", sending Zeng Yuqun to the throne of Hong Kong's richest man. As of January 17, 2022, Zeng Yuqun's personal value has exceeded 320 billion yuan.
However, the wood shows in the forest, and the wind will destroy it.
The Ningde era, which is firmly sitting on a trillion-dollar market value, is in a "highlight" moment and is also in a "embattled" state.
Eye-catching performance
Not long ago, CATL handed over a "beautiful" report card, achieving revenue of 73.362 billion yuan in the first three quarters of 2021, an increase of 132.73% year-on-year, and net profit of 7.75 billion yuan, an increase of 130.9% year-on-year.
In contrast, BYD, which ranks second in domestic power battery shipments, achieved operating income of 54.307 billion yuan in the first three quarters of 2021, an increase of 21.98% year-on-year; in the first three quarters, it achieved a net profit of 2.443 billion yuan, down 28.43% year-on-year.
Zeng Yuqun, chairman of CATL
In the same period, Guoxuan Hi-Tech's revenue in the first three quarters was 5.725 billion yuan, up 40.4% year-on-year; net profit attributable to the mother was 67.8305 million yuan, down 20.45% year-on-year.
This means that from the perspective of volume and profitability, the Ningde era has become a unicorn in the domestic power battery market.
In the Ningde era, why did it become the new "stock king"?
In fact, in 2011, the Ningde era has already taken action.
In 2011, Zeng Yuqun began to study the power battery business and took the initiative to contact the BMW team. At that time, BMW, the technical requirements are very strict, Zeng Yuqun led the team, worked hard, eat through the technical standard requirements of BMW more than 800 pages, but also nibbled down the technical standard requirements of more than 800 pages of BMW.
The development of the Ningde era is inseparable from the "BMW Group"
In 2012, BMW selected the NINGDE era. The two sides cooperated to develop a power battery for BMW Brilliance's Nori Electric Vehicle, which was a key battle in the Ningde era. Since then, the story of the Ningde era has escalated.
With the cooperation foundation with the BMW team, CATL soon established cooperative relations with saic, BAIC, Geely, Great Wall and other car companies.
In 2016, the top three car companies in terms of new energy vehicle sales were BYD, Geely and BAIC. ATD was self-supplied with batteries at the time, while Geely and BAIC were both supplied by CATL.
Riding on the rapid growth of the domestic new energy vehicle market, in 2017, the installed capacity of CATL surpassed BYD and Panasonic for the first time, ranking first in the world. On June 11, 2018, CATL was successfully listed on the Gem Board.
Never been surpassed
According to public information, the battery system is the key to the performance of electric vehicles, and batteries account for 35%-50% of the total cost of the vehicle.
If the battery has become the main artery that runs through the entire new energy vehicle, then this major artery, car companies do not want to be caught by the Ningde era. Therefore, some new energy vehicles began to choose to walk on "two legs", both in cooperation with battery factories in research and development, but also in the choice of self-built factories.
For example, when Volkswagen plans to invest in the domestic second-tier brand Guoxuan Hi-Tech, it also invests 3.5 billion yuan to build its own battery factory.
NINGDE times booth
For example, Tesla is looking for new battery partners on the one hand, and on the other hand, it is quick to build its own battery factory.
Second-tier battery manufacturers, such as Zhongxin Aviation, Guoxuan Hi-Tech, Yiwei Lithium Energy, Fu Neng Technology and other enterprises, these second-tier battery manufacturers are also catching up with the Ningde era, providing differentiated battery technologies around battery materials, battery structure, battery safety and other aspects.
For another example, the biggest opponent of the Ningde era, LG New Energy, sacrificed the weapon of "IPO listing" and shouted that in the Ningde era, LG new energy will surpass the Ningde era.
According to public information, in the first half of 2021, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced a total of more than 2400 models in the effective catalog of new energy models, and more than 1200 models of supporting power batteries originated from the Ningde era, accounting for about 50%, which is the most supporting power battery manufacturers.
However, the Ningde era has long invested money in the upstream and downstream industrial chain, from the most upstream lithium ore, lithium salt, to the positive and negative electrode materials of the battery, manufacturing equipment, and then to the automobile-related chips, chassis, automatic driving, and lidar technology, the Ningde era has long laid out a complete industrial chain.
NINGDE era UPS lithium battery cabinet
The market's first production capacity and complete supply chain, the combination of the two, helped the Ningde era to build an airtight wall in the new energy battery market, and no company can surpass it for the time being.
This means that even if other battery manufacturers rivet their efforts to "kill" over, the Ningde era can still cope.
Can't "sit back and relax"
Under the high light, there are also hidden "hidden worries" in the Ningde era.
Under the premise that there is no major change in lithium battery technology, it is difficult for the Ningde era to be robbed of the boss position for the time being, but the market share of the Ningde era may be eroded by other manufacturers.
According to the research report of Soochow Securities, all the batteries used by Xiaopeng Automobile at the beginning were used in the Ningde era, and from 2020, it began to purchase the batteries of Ewell lithium energy.
GAC was originally a customer in the Ningde era, but in the first half of 2021, more than 80% of GAC's battery orders were given to avic lithium batteries that they invested in.
The first phase of the Sichuan Times Power Battery project was officially put into operation
Great Wall is also using batteries from brother company Honeycomb Energy. According to public information: in the first half of 2021, 40% of the power batteries of the Great Wall were supplied by Hive Energy.
At the same time, in the second half of 2019, after the "white list" of power batteries was lifted, foreign power battery manufacturers also began to exert efforts in China.
Under the fierce competition of power batteries, the gross profit margin of the Ningde era will continue to decline. According to Soochow Securities' estimates, its gross margin is expected to be 26% in 2022.
In the context of the continuous improvement of the market penetration rate of new energy vehicles, the "war" of many battery manufacturers to "encircle and suppress" the Ningde era has just begun.
The Ningde era cannot "sit back and relax" for the time being.
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