Speaking of Lithuania, we all know that this is an unfriendly country to China, although Lithuania's population is only 2.8 million people, in the international is a completely small country, but in the field of laser industry, but it can be regarded as a big country, Lithuania's three major laser companies 90% of the products are used for export, even in some special applications of lasers, occupying more than 50% of the global market, in the Chinese market, Lithuania's lasers are more strategic, in the domestic hospital occupied a very prominent position.
As we all know, China is also a laser industry power, is the world's largest laser application market, whether it is the number of laser companies or laser industry output value, far more than Lithuania, the output value of the mainland laser industry reached 68 billion, laser companies up to more than 1,000.
Then some people are worried that the strong competitiveness of Lithuania's laser industry will cause a problem of card neck in China's laser industry? After all, Lithuania has strong technology and occupies more than half of the world's market. There is also, why is Lithuania's laser technology so strong, and where is it stronger than China?
Speaking of Lithuania's laser industry, it has to be said that the lithuanian laser field of the three musketeers EKSPLA, LIGHT CONVERSION and ALTECHNA, these three companies are the core representative enterprises of the Lithuanian laser industry, EKSPLA has been established for 30 years, is the largest laser company in Lithuania, this company produces picosecond, femtosecond and nanosecond lasers in the world dominates the world, and the export of picosecond lasers accounts for 50% of the global market share. The related laser product categories reach more than 300 kinds.
LIGHT CONVERSION mainly focuses on the research and development of ultrafast laser technology, the production of ultra-high-speed parameter generators accounts for 60% of the global market share, the development of TOPAS and ORPHEUS series of OPA accounts for the global continuously adjustable wavelength ultrafast light source market share of up to 80%.
The domestic popular femtosecond laser surgery for the treatment of myopia, the femtosecond laser used, basically 100% imported from Lithuania, in some spectroscopic instruments, also use Lithuanian lasers and laser lenses, and related equipment is used by NASA, the European Union Space Agency and Israel's nuclear research center in the United States, the world's top 100 universities, 90% of the use of Lithuanian-made laser equipment.
So why is Lithuania able to dominate the global mainstream market on picosecond and femtosecond lasers? Is the foundation of China's laser industry relatively poor, so is the technical gap with Lithuania farther away?
In fact, it is not, China in the fiber laser, has been in the forefront of the world's advanced, China has been able to produce 10,000 watts of single-mode fiber lasers, in terms of laser cutting machines, beat the European and American imports, so that the price of domestic laser cutting machines directly fell by 90%, the price of 10,000 watts of domestic laser cutting machines is only 600,000, and the import can reach three or five million.
Not only that, China's domestic fiber lasers are also exported to many developed countries, Europe, the United States, Japan and South Korea are imported from China's Ruike laser and Chuangxin laser laser products, it can be said that in the field of fiber lasers, China's technology has kept up with the global advanced level.
The reason why For a long time, China lagged behind in terms of picosecond and femtosecond ultrafast lasers, because this market is too small, to know that Lithuania, which occupies half of the global picosecond femtosecond laser market, the national laser industry output value is only about 1.2 billion yuan, even if it occupies the global picosecond femtosecond laser market, the entire output value is only 2.4 billion yuan.
In contrast, Ruike Laser, the largest laser company in China, has an operating income of 3.410 billion yuan in 2021 alone, an increase of 47.18% year-on-year; a net profit of 474 million yuan, and there are laser companies with annual revenue of more than 1 billion yuan in Wuhan and Shenzhen, which focus on high-power pulse and continuous fiber lasers, high-power semiconductor lasers, etc.
In other words, the reason why China is at the forefront of the world in terms of high-power lasers is because its market application is broad, the market prospect of enterprises is large, and it meets the income and profit requirements of capital for enterprises.
The reason why China lags behind in the ultrafast lasers of picoseconds and femtoseconds is because the space in this market is too small, it is easy to see the ceiling, and there are already many mature opponents in the market, so Chinese companies are late in the ultrafast laser, less investment, and it is naturally difficult to match Lithuania's ultrafast lasers.
However, Lithuania can no longer pinch the neck of China's laser industry.
The reason is that in the past 5 years, China's domestic femtosecond lasers have made major breakthroughs, the gap between China and Lithuania in ultrafast lasers has gradually narrowed, Huari Laser, Han's Laser, Anyang Laser and other enterprises developed femtosecond lasers, in the neutron source, partial fiber, special fiber and other core devices you have gradually achieved domestic substitution, localization rate increased to more than 95%, and has been applied to high-end industrial manufacturing and life sciences.
It is not difficult to imagine that in China's ultrafast laser, there may also be another Rixo laser in the future, and this localization trend is already underway, in other words, Lithuania's ultrafast laser wants to card China's neck, which is almost impossible.