For the global power battery hegemony of the Ningde era, LG New Energy has been coveted for a long time, and at present, the South Korean power battery manufacturer seems to be interested in stepping up the offensive.
On the eve of the upcoming IPO, LG New Energy has remained hot in recent days, and this capital action, which is considered to set the largest IPO record in South Korean history, has ignited the enthusiasm of the Korean market, and LG New Energy is also taking advantage of the trend to make this fire more vigorous.
A few days ago, according to foreign media reports, LG New Energy is expanding production capacity in 6 countries, hoping to help seize the first throne of the global power battery.
According to the plan, this expansion will involve multiple markets such as North America, Europe, China and Southeast Asia. Specifically, LG New Energy will invest 5.6 trillion won in cooperation with GM to build a factory in the United States, 1.4 trillion won to build its own factory in Poland, 1.2 trillion won in China, and 65.4 billion won in South Korea. In addition, LG New Energy will also establish a joint plant with Stellantis in Canada and a joint plant with Hyundai Motor in Indonesia.
This large-scale capacity expansion in the global market is funded by LG New Energy's upcoming IPO.
According to the latest news, LG New Energy set the issue price at 30 trillion won (about 1600 yuan) per share, and according to the issue price, LG New Energy's IPO valuation is about 70.2 trillion won (equivalent to 375 billion yuan). This figure will set a new record for IPO in South Korea, and its market capitalization after listing is second only to Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix in South Korea.
In the prospectus, LG New Energy said that in addition to the plan to develop new products and build smart factories to improve product quality and quality, the rest of the fundraising is used for expansion. This is evident in its determination.
In the past year, compared with the performance of the Ningde era and LG New Energy, there is still a certain gap between LG New Energy and the former. According to data from SNE Research, a South Korean research institute, from January to November 2021, the global power battery market share of CATL was 31.8%, and LG New Energy was 20.5%, a difference of about 11 percentage points.
Nevertheless, for the era beyond Ningde, LG New Energy still shows full confidence. LG New Energy CEO Kwon Young-soo Kwon recently told the media that LG New Energy currently has a large backlog of orders, taking this into account, LG is confident to surpass the Ningde era in terms of market share and become the world's first.
In addition, the South Korean head battery manufacturer also mentioned that the current LG new energy is superior to the Ningde era in terms of material technology and the number of intellectual property rights, which is conducive to surpassing the Ningde era in the long run.
The killer skill of LG new energy is to have a faster expansion speed in the global market than in the Ningde era. It is understood that LG New Energy's current customers cover Tesla, Geely, and Lucid Motors, which is known as Tesla's number one competitor, and almost all mainstream car companies in the European market.
Kwon Young-soo said the CATL's high dependence on Chinese customers is a weakness. "We are at the forefront of reaching global customers in Europe and the United States."
LG new energy is menacing, and the Ningde era naturally did not sit still. In terms of capacity expansion, the ningde era is planned to reach about 600GWh by 2025. This goal is actually higher than LG's new energy plan, and on January 10, Kwon Young-soo said at an event that the company will increase its battery production capacity by 2.6 times to 400 GWh within three years.
In addition to production capacity, catheter era is also expanding the technology track. On January 18, Times Electric Service, a wholly-owned subsidiary of CATL, released the overall solution of EVOGO (Lexing Power Exchange) and the combination of power exchange service brand, officially entering the power exchange track.
In fact, in the Ningde era and LG new energy competition at the same time, the industry's second-tier manufacturers are also secretly exerting efforts, the domestic player AVIC lithium battery plans to reach 500GWh in 2025 production capacity planning, hive energy is also speeding up the IPO process of the science and technology innovation board.
At present, the new energy market penetration rate is still huge space, the power battery manufacturers are in full competition, LG new energy can shake the first throne of the Ningde era, it is not yet known, but what is certain is that there will be new changes in the power battery market pattern.