Chairman of Fu Neng Technology Wang Yu
More than 20 years ago, with the ideal of developing low-carbon energy and helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, scientist Wang Yu devoted himself to the lithium battery industry, and in 2009, he returned to China to found Fu Neng Technology and began to "deeply cultivate" the ternary soft pack power battery. With excellent R & D strength, Fu Neng Technology has become the first batch of enterprises in China to achieve mass production of ternary soft pack power batteries, and its product shipments and installed capacity have ranked first in the country for three consecutive years, winning the reputation of "king of soft packs".
From a corner of Ganzhou, Jiangxi Province, to a global layout, from a small factory with small production capacity and few customers to an "industry big coffee" with tens of billions of orders in hand, in the context of the era of rapid development of the new energy automobile industry, what is the mystery of Fu Neng Technology, which seizes the opportunity of energy revolution and drives on the fast track of development? The "Science and Technology Innovation China" research activity recently entered Fu Neng Technology to explore the "hardcore technology" behind the "King of Soft Bags".
This event is also a stop for the Shanghai Stock Exchange to serve Zhou Gan's southbound trip. In recent years, the Shanghai Stock Exchange has actively exerted its own advantages, in accordance with the three basic directions of "sending policies, sending services, and sending talents", innovating mechanisms, tapping potential, closely linking with local governments, mobilizing member units and industry forces, taking multiple measures at the same time, forming a joint force, supporting the economic and social revitalization and development of Gannan and providing one-stop services for investors in Gannan.
Increase the size of technology research and development Energy density again leads
Walking into the clean and bright clean workshop of Fu Neng Technology Zhenjiang Base, a batch of positive and negative electrodes, diaphragms, electrolytes and other raw materials, under harsh environmental conditions, after several fully automated processes, combined into a soft package of batteries, and finally become the source of power for thousands of new energy vehicles.
In the view of Wang Yu, chairman of Fu Neng Technology, the power battery industry has the characteristics of high technical barriers and rapid technical iteration, and only continuous investment in research and development can ensure the leading technical strength.
Under the guidance of R&D drive and the idea of "production generation, reserve generation, development generation", Fu Neng Technology's R&D investment has maintained a rapid growth trend. From 2016 to 2020, the company's R&D expenses increased from 0.27 billion yuan to 372 million yuan, with a compound annual growth rate of 92.66%. In 2021, the momentum of high R&D investment in Fu Neng Technology will not decrease. According to the 2021 semi-annual report, the company's current R&D expenses accounted for 28.21% of revenue, an increase of about 61 million yuan over the same period last year.
In addition to financial support, research and development needs talent support.
In order to attract and gather talents, Fu Neng Technology launched its first equity incentive plan in mid-2021, granting a total of 42.83 million restricted shares to 555 people, including core technical personnel, and the total number of shares and incentives involved in this large-scale incentive plan ranked among the top ten companies on the Science and Technology Innovation Board at that time. In addition, the equity incentives gave revenue appraisal guidelines of 3 billion yuan, 7 billion yuan, 14 billion yuan and 20 billion yuan from 2021 to 2024 respectively, demonstrating the company's confidence in the rapid growth of performance.
Hard work pays off. With years of continuous investment and technology accumulation, Fu Neng Technology ushered in the research and development harvest period, and good news was frequently spread.
At present, Funeng Kezhi has developed and verified the next generation of power batteries with an energy density of 330Wh/kg. The technology can still provide 80% of the capacity at an ambient temperature of minus 20 ° C, can be applied worldwide, and has passed the relevant certification of the US authority. For the significance of this battery, many people in the industry believe that it is possible to set off a new technological revolution in the battery industry. The company's other advanced technologies, such as "high specific capacity cathode material technology" and "power lithium-ion battery separator and its preparation technology", have also entered the industrialization stage.
"We very much hope to develop batteries that meet the needs of users to travel better, such as 1,000 km cruising range, 5 minutes of fast full charge, winter without being affected by low temperatures, this is our goal." When it comes to the mileage anxiety and charging anxiety of new energy vehicle users, Wang Yu is full of confidence.
Bind well-known customers And upgrade the system capabilities
Advanced technical strength and strong research and development capabilities make Fu Neng Technology stand out in the field of power batteries, and also attract the attention of Daimler, the parent company of mercedes-Benz, a global luxury car brand.
According to Wang Yu's recollection, Fu Neng Technology and Daimler "got together" in 2016, and at the end of 2018, with ultra-high energy density and other technical indicators, defeated several global first-line power battery companies, signed a power battery supply contract with Daimler of 10 billion euros, and agreed to supply a total scale of 170GWh of power batteries from 2021 to 2027. In addition, Daimler also invested 904.5 million yuan in Fu Neng Technology, becoming a strategic shareholder holding 3% of the shares, further consolidating the cooperative relationship between the two sides. As a result, Fu Neng Technology has become one of the few companies in China's power battery industry that is deeply bound to the world's top car companies.
Just as BMW "rebuilt" the Ningde era, the in-depth cooperation with Daimler has also enabled Fu Neng Technology's system capabilities to achieve all-round improvement.
On the one hand, in order to undertake Daimler's order of more than 10 billion euros, Fu Neng Technology designed and built a production base with an annual production capacity of 24GWh in Zhenjiang. Wang Yu revealed that Daimler participated in and tracked the design of the Zhenjiang factory throughout the process, and put forward many high standards and strict requirements for technology, quality, management, etc. "The pressure was very great, but fortunately we persevered and obtained the recognition of the other party." With the start of batch delivery of batteries in the second half of 2021, Daimler's team at the Zhenjiang base of Fu Neng Technology has exceeded 100 people, and it is deeply involved in the operation and management of the whole process of the factory.
On the other hand, Daimler's mature management experience and forward-looking environmental protection concept subtly affect Fu Neng Technology. Taking the Zhenjiang base of Fu Neng Technology as an example, due to Daimler's great emphasis on "carbon neutrality", the base has incorporated the concept of "carbon neutrality" at the beginning of the design, and in 2021, it will be certified by the third-party DEKRA, becoming the first power battery factory in the world to achieve "carbon neutrality".
With the deepening of cooperation between Daimler and Fu Neng Technology, the demonstration effect is becoming increasingly apparent, and domestic leading car companies such as GUANGZHOU Automobile Group, Geely Automobile and Dongfeng Motor have successively joined the "circle of friends" of Fu Neng Technology, and the fixed-point models have also shown the characteristics of diversification and high-end.
Starting from the second half of 2021, benefiting from Daimler and Beijing Benz, as well as the mass production stage of GAC Group's designated models, Fu Neng Technology's revenue has increased significantly. In the first three quarters of 2021, the company achieved operating income of 1.965 billion yuan, an increase of 252.14% year-on-year. Among them, the revenue of 1.088 billion yuan in the third quarter exceeded the sum of the first half of the year. At the same time, according to the company's recently disclosed data, the sales volume of the main business in the fourth quarter of 2021 was further increased to 1.31GWh (preliminary accounting) on the basis of 1.16GWh in the third quarter.
Guide industrial development and shape the domestic chain of soft packages
It is understood that there are currently a number of technical routes in the power battery industry, the mainstream cathode materials are ternary and lithium iron phosphate, and the packaging form is soft pack, square and cylindrical. The ternary soft pack power battery is favored by high-end car companies due to its advantages of high energy density, good safety performance, long life and strong temperature adaptation. With the advent of the globalization wave of new energy vehicles, the penetration rate of domestic soft pack batteries is expected to increase rapidly.
Talking about why it insists on growing together with the domestic industrial chain in the field of ternary soft packages, Wang Yu believes that if Fu Neng Technology wants to seize the opportunity of the great development of the power battery industry, it must have a strong industrial chain as a support, and according to the current development speed of the company, foreign suppliers have been unable to meet the demand.
"Generally speaking, it takes about 5 years for foreign supporting industries to match a large-scale expansion plan, and such an efficiency, whether it is Fu Neng or other lithium battery factories, can not meet the strong demand for power battery production capacity in the downstream automobile industry." In Wang Yu's view, at a time when the advantages of China's manufacturing and China's speed are becoming more and more significant, Fu Neng Technology, as a leading enterprise in ternary soft packages, has the obligation and ability to promote the rapid development of the domestic industrial chain.
In fact, Wang Yu still has a longer-term thinking.
First of all, the material cost of soft pack batteries is the lowest in all packaging forms, but in the past, it was limited by the maturity of the industrial chain, resulting in higher investment costs in equipment and other aspects, resulting in the misunderstanding of high costs of soft pack batteries, "after large-scale mass production, the advantages in cost will gradually appear."
Secondly, solid-state batteries are recognized as the main research and development direction of next-generation power batteries, and soft packs are the best packaging form for solid-state batteries. Wang Yu revealed that Fu Neng Technology laid out the soft package process in advance, and also based on the consideration of the iteration of the future technical route, "the soft package process is the most convenient for solid-state batteries, and all equipment can be used seamlessly."
According to reports, Fu Neng Technology's semi-solid-state battery samples to the OEM customers have received good feedback, the company's unique soft lamination technology and production line can achieve switching to semi-solid, solid-state batteries, and the cost and quality can be controlled.
With the guidance and promotion of leading enterprises such as Fu Neng Technology, the mainland is forming a stable and efficient soft pack battery industry chain. It is understood that Fu Neng Technology has joined hands with Huayou Cobalt, Shanghai Shanshan and other enterprises to reach cooperation in the field of positive and negative electrode materials, and gradually realized localization in areas such as manufacturing equipment and aluminum-plastic film that have long relied on imports.
