Apple's concept stock leaders parted ways: Luxshare Precision / Goertek / Lens Technology each developed in a new direction

Jiwei Network reported that Luxun Precision, Lens Technology, Goertek Shares, these three manufacturers earlier rely on the smart phone business, the performance has achieved quite good growth. After entering the Apple supply chain, the performance has achieved a "hanging-like" leap, and has been given the title of "fruit chain" leader.

However, in recent years, the traditional consumer electronics pattern has entered the stage of stock competition from the growth stage, and the demand for smart phone markets has entered a period of abnormal saturation. The technological transformation of 5G not only accelerates the trend of replacement tide, but also brings subversive opportunities to new fields such as unmanned driving, Internet of Vehicles, and VR in the future.

Therefore, driven by the industry trend dividend, in addition to continuing to deepen the original mobile phone business, the above manufacturers have also aimed at the exploration and in-depth layout of new areas. But under the parting business development strategy, who will laugh last?

Relying on the mobile phone market: the performance has achieved leapfrog growth

Look at the growth history of the three companies in turn.

Looking at the development of Luxshare Precision for more than ten years, 2017 can be described as a crucial year, because from this year on, its performance is like pressing the acceleration button and beginning to soar all the way.

Since entering apple supply chain for the first time in 2011, Luxshare Precision has continued to expand Apple's product line, especially since it entered the Apple AirPods product supply chain in 2017, and has accelerated the order share of the original assembler Inventec. Everbright Securities pointed out that at present, The share of Luxun Precision in AirPods has reached 60%-65%, and the share of AirPods Pro in the noise-reducing version has reached 100%, which is the largest supplier of Apple's AirPods products.

From the perspective of the business change of Luxshare Precision, at first it transformed from connectors to smart phone acoustics and successfully cut into Apple's supply chain; then gradually expanded its product line, successively introducing wireless headphones, smart phones and other products, firmly grasping the opportunities of the mobile phone industry by strengthening the consumer electronics business, and increasingly strengthening the in-depth cooperation with Apple.

Looking at Lens Technology, as the core supplier of Apple's mobile phone glass cover, it was initially only a glass screen OEM, and now, it has developed into a leading enterprise of mobile phone cover glass, and its market value has also exceeded the peak of 100 billion yuan.

Also in 2017, when the performance growth was slow and there was a sharp decline, with the continuous improvement of the glass process, the constraints such as heat dissipation and strength were solved, the "double glass" solution was gradually favored, and the demand for superimposed 3D glass increased, and the market space of the mobile glass industry ushered in 3-5 times growth. Benefiting from the iteration of consumer electronics, especially the listing of new machines such as Apple, which greatly drove product demand orders, Lens Technology ushered in a performance inflection point, and its revenue and net profit in 2017 increased by 55.94% and 70.07% year-on-year, respectively.

Although it has since experienced the largest decline in net profit in 2018, in the following two years, due to the significant increase in sales of 3D glass products in the front and back covers of high-end mobile phones at home and abroad, coupled with the continuous release of smart wearable devices, high-end on-board equipment and other fields, the performance of Lens Technology has rebounded.

From the perspective of market demand, with the rapid growth of sapphire applications in the field of consumer electronics, downstream smart watch mirrors and back covers, smart phones and tablets camera protection lenses, fingerprint recognition lenses and other components are in strong market demand, all of which bring continuous growth opportunities to Lens Technology.

In addition, in October 2020, through the acquisition of Kesheng Taizhou and Kelitaizhou for 9.9 billion yuan in cash, Lens Technology was able to enter the supply chain of Apple metal chassis and enter the field of global consumer electronics metal appearance structural parts.

As for Goertek, with the accumulation of its own acoustic technology and the "big customer strategy", it has won Samsung, Sony, Nokia and other mobile phone brand customers early. In 2010, the official release of the iPhone4 not only set off a wave of smartphones around the world, but also Wentertek, which had become a leading enterprise in acoustic components at that time, also entered the Apple supply chain to supply acoustic and optical components.

In the same year, the market value of Goertek reached 20 billion, and then climbed year by year, and by 2021, the market value exceeded 160 billion yuan.

Judging from the business operation history of the above three "fruit chain" leaders, all of them rely on the drive of the smart phone business, and the performance can develop rapidly. From the perspective of the market, in recent years, the traditional consumer electronics pattern has entered the stage of stock competition from the growth period, and the demand for smart phone markets has entered a period of abnormal saturation.

In the technological transformation of 4G to 5G, not only the base station to the multi-port, multi-wave trend, 5G has also accelerated the trend of replacement tide, and the shipment of the smartphone market is expected to further grow. At the same time, the promotion of 5G and AI technology in the future will also bring disruptive opportunities to new fields such as unmanned driving, Internet of Vehicles, and VR.

Therefore, driven by the industry trend dividend, in addition to continuing to deepen the original mobile phone business, the above manufacturers are also aiming at exploring and in-depth layout of new areas to build a new momentum for performance growth.

Goertek shares: add vr/AR meta-universe new concept

As the global 5G technology penetration rate continues to increase, countries are accelerating the development and layout of 5G construction, which not only brings a strong impetus to the development of the VR/AR industry, the demand for smart wearable and other related hardware products continues to rise, as well as the heating up of the meta-universe concept, but also brings good performance growth momentum to related manufacturers.

Goertek, which has been in the VR/AR field for many years, is currently not only able to provide customers with VR virtual reality product design and manufacturing services, but also has the ability to provide overall product solutions in the fields of precision optics, acoustics, sensors, and precision structural parts related to VR/AR.

At the technical and strategic level, Goertek spent 165 million yuan to acquire 9.80% of Kopin's equity as early as 2017, increasing the VR layout. In addition, it also took the lead in introducing the world's leading 12-inch nano-embossing production line to create the world's leading XR high-end optical components industry base.

According to Jiang Bin, chairman of Goertek Group, Goertek began to lay out the VR/AR industry in 2012 and currently occupies 70% of the global market share of high-end virtual reality headsets.

Lens Technology: Based on glass to enter photovoltaics

In addition to VR/AR, photovoltaics are also the hottest industry tracks today. In the context of the booming industry, photovoltaic companies in the secondary market are sought after by capital, and valuations are naturally rising.

Relying on the leading position in the fields of glass, sapphire, precision metal, ceramics and other fields, Lens Technology on the one hand uses industrial nodes to actively extend the integration and development of upstream and downstream; on the other hand, after officially announcing its entry into the photovoltaic field in November 2021, it is boldly promoting the landing of the photovoltaic strategy.

On November 3, 2021, Lens Technology issued an announcement that the company recently set up a wholly-owned subsidiary, Hunan Lens New Energy Co., Ltd., with a registered capital of 1 billion yuan, mainly engaged in photovoltaic glass products, photovoltaic equipment and components, photovoltaic power generation projects and other businesses, and obtained the business license issued by the Market Supervision and Administration Bureau of Yuelu District of Changsha City.

Lens Technology said that this investment is the company's active expansion of the main product application space, grasp the "double carbon" economy, closely follow the energy structure transformation, closely follow the photovoltaic industry rapid development opportunities of the major strategic practice, in line with the company's medium and long-term development planning and sustainable development concept, will create a new medium and long-term growth point for the company, as well as accelerate the company's energy structure to renewable energy transformation.

The following month, it reached a strategic cooperation with Kaisheng Group to actively expand the introduction of photovoltaic glass production equipment and the reserve of material resources. Subsequently, they joined hands in Chuzhou, Anhui Province, and invested in the new energy and electronic information industry park project in Fengyang County.

Although entering the photovoltaic field is called "cross-border" by the outside world, for it, this is undoubtedly a precise layout to seize the industrial outlet. Based on the market's higher requirements for the transmittance and strength of photovoltaic glass, Lens Technology's technical support in the field of consumer electronics is also applicable to this field.

Luxun Precision: More than 10 billion investment strong into the automotive circle

Unlike Goertek, Lens Technology's layout of VR/AR and photovoltaic new business areas, Luxshare Precision, which is also the leader of the "fruit chain", seems to still "single-mindedly" deeply cultivate in the consumer electronics foundry business such as mobile phones and computers, but it also has a layout in VR/AR and other fields, and has entered the automotive market.

In fact, in the past, there were many Apple concept stocks that were equivalent to the market value of Lixun Precision, but until now, whether it is market value or performance, Luxun Precision is far away from the rest of the people. The main reason is that many mergers and acquisitions have not only enabled Luxshare Precision to achieve epitaxial expansion at a lower cost, but more importantly, it has also helped it complete the in-depth expansion of its business. In the past few years, Luxshare Precision has gradually entered the consumer electronics industry chain, communication field, automotive electronics field, wearable field, acoustic field, camera module and other fields from the connector business.

Especially since 2020, Luxshare Precision has further enhanced its position as an Apple foundry. In July of the same year, Luxshare Precision announced that it intends to acquire 100% of the shares of Jiangsu Wistron and Kunshan Weixin with its controlling shareholder, Lixun Limited, for 3.3 billion yuan. After the completion of the transaction, Luxun Precision acquired two subsidiaries of Wistron Group, an iPhone foundry, and laid the foundation for its continuous deepening of mobile phone and computer foundry.

Not long ago, Lixun Precision announced that the company signed a Strategic Cooperation Framework Agreement with Chery Holding Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Chery Holdings"), Chery Automobile Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Chery Shares"), Chery New Energy Automobile Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Chery New Energy") ("Chery Holdings", "Chery Shares", "Chery New Energy" and its affiliates collectively referred to as "Chery Group") in Wuhu to lay a strategic partnership for the two sides.

The company and Chery New Energy intend to jointly establish a joint venture company, specializing in the research and development and manufacturing of new energy vehicles. Luxun Precision intends to subscribe for 500 million yuan to hold 30% of the registered capital of the cooperative subsidiary, and Chery New Energy to subscribe for 1.167 billion yuan and hold 70% of the equity of the registered capital. The cooperation between the two parties is exclusive, that is, Chery Group cannot cooperate with other automotive foundry enterprises in the OEM business, but can independently oem business or cooperate with auto brand enterprises in OEM business.

At the same time, the company's controlling shareholder, Lixun Limited, intends to purchase 19.88% of the equity of Chery Holdings, 7.87% of the equity of Chery and 6.24% of the equity of Chery New Energy held by Qingdao Wudaokou for 10.054 billion yuan.

Luxun Precision believes that under the new pattern, the market needs ODM to build cars. Chery's vehicle research and development base has also improved rapidly in recent years, and in the learning mode of double T (Toyota R&D quality system and Tesla subversive innovation), it grew against the trend last year, and it is also the largest export volume of domestic brand car companies. Luxun Precision's experience and market reputation in consumer electronics over the years can cooperate with Chery to develop another new industry - to build a good car for others. This is in line with the needs of market development, and it also meets the difficulties of the breakthrough in the growth of Luxshare Tier1. Luxshare Precision focuses on providing industry chain component solutions for the market, and is also committed to becoming the global leader in auto parts Tier1.

In fact, as Apple's core supplier, the three are undoubtedly very dependent on Apple, and with the launch of the iPhone 13, it has been found that 34 domestic companies have been kicked out of apple supply chain, resulting in a sharp decline in performance. This also shows that Apple can indeed bring a lot of profit income to enterprises, but the excessive dependence on it may also cause suppliers to be in the crisis of being "led by large customers". Combined with the current business layout of the three manufacturers in this article, it seems to reflect from the side that some leading manufacturers have already opened a decentralized layout, and the willingness to develop new business growth poles has become stronger. (Proofreading/New)