In modern society, takeaway brothers and flash delivery brothers have become the most familiar group of urbanites, who shuttle through the streets and alleys of the city to provide convenience for people's lives. Providing various services for tens of millions of instant delivery workers in China has become a derivative business.
Recently, Hangzhou Yugu Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Yugu Technology"), the company behind the two-wheel battery swap APP "lithium battery swap" for electric vehicles, submitted the "prospectus" to the GEM of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, starting the IPO process and sprinting to "the first share of battery swap service", which also makes the new industry of electric two-wheeled vehicle battery swap pay the water, is this a good business?
In 3 years, the net profit has more than 5 times
According to the prospectus, Yugu Technology is a manufacturer and service provider focusing on intelligent charging and swapping equipment for electric two-wheeled vehicles, providing battery swapping services to electric two-wheeled vehicle users through new infrastructure and digital management of the charging and swapping network. Its main products and services are battery swapping services and charging and swapping equipment.
According to public information, Yugu Technology only began to enter the electric two-wheeler battery swap market in 2019, and launched this lithium battery swap, and as a result, there were more than 30,000 users in the second year. As of June 30 this year, Yugu Technology has launched 23,700 battery swap cabinets, 517,500 batteries, and 391,100 online users in 66 cities.
The company, located in Yuhang, made it clear in the prospectus that the company's customer objects are mainly takeaway riders and flash delivery brothers: "The main end users of the company's battery swap business are instant delivery workers such as riders, who are heavy users of batteries, and have higher requirements for battery quality and convenience of battery replacement, and will give preference to brands with good battery performance and many outlets." ”
However, don't underestimate these instant delivery workers, because at least from the current point of view, the profits of this business are still very considerable: the prospectus shows that from 2020 to 2022, Yugu Technology's operating income will be 90 million yuan, 230 million yuan, and 560 million yuan respectively, and the net profit will be 15.2569 million yuan, 33.0473 million yuan, and 81.3426 million yuan in the same period. In just three years, the net profit increased by more than 5 times. In the first half of this year, Yugu Technology's operating income and net profit were 410 million yuan and 59.4404 million yuan respectively.
According to the revenue structure, the current business of Yugu Technology mainly includes two parts, one is battery swapping services, and the other is the sales of charging and swapping equipment. However, in recent years, the company's battery swap service has become the main revenue of the company, and currently contributes more than 98% to the total revenue.
A post-70s female teacher in a small town came to Hangzhou to do an IPO?
According to the enterprise investigation, Yugu Technology was established in May 2012. From 2020 to 2021, it established 3 wholly-owned subsidiaries: Hangzhou Lithium Technology Co., Ltd., Hangzhou Lithium Technology Co., Ltd., and Hangzhou Gangkuai Technology Co., Ltd.
According to public information, Liu Aiming, the founder of Yugu Technology, was born in 1970, and after graduating from junior college, he worked as a mathematics teacher in the middle school for coal mine children in Tianhe Town, Ji'an County, Jiangxi Province. In 1992, he served as the propaganda officer and comprehensive enterprise manager of Jiangxi State-owned 4380 Factory, and then went to Hangzhou for development.
In November 2009, Liu Aiming and Xiao Jie established Zhejiang Yusong Technology Co., Ltd., which is engaged in the production and sales of on-board film and television products, intelligent equipment and systems, charging and swapping equipment and systems.
In May 2012, Liu Aiming established Yugu Technology, initially, Yugu Technology mainly undertook some Internet of Things software and hardware business of Yusong Technology, and this process completed a certain amount of technology accumulation for the later charging and swapping business.
According to public information, in 2017, Yugu Technology sold the first charging pile based on the charging small zebra system and officially launched the charging business. In 2019, Yugu Technology's first self-developed lithium battery was put on the market, opening the operation of battery swap business with a larger market space.
Since then, in December 2020, Yugu Technology acquired the charging and swapping business of Yusong Technology with an asset transaction amount of 7.9734 million yuan, and the company has continued to grow and develop. According to public information, the last round of financing before the IPO of Yugu Technology occurred in August 2022, when it received a total investment of more than 600 million yuan from Shenzhen Venture Capital, CITIC Securities, Yuhong Investment and other institutions, with a post-investment valuation of 4.7 billion yuan.
Tens of millions of instant delivery personnel are the foundation for the development of this track
In fact, Yugu Technology is not the pioneer of the electric two-wheeler battery swap industry, and it is not even the largest one. As early as 2016, battery swap businesses began to appear in the market, such as Xiaoha battery swap, E battery swap, Yiqi battery swap and so on.
According to the survey report of Zhiyan Consulting, there are more than 300 two-wheeled vehicle battery swap companies in China, of which there are more than 30 relatively large battery swap companies, including tower battery swap, Xiaoha battery swap, E battery swap, Yiqi battery swap, Hello battery swap, knight battery swap, smart rental travel, etc.
According to public information, as of the end of July this year, Tower Energy has deployed more than 60,000 power swap points, with more than 1 million users on the grid; according to the official website of E-motor E battery swap, it has entered more than 60 cities and put more than 8,000 battery swap cabinets; smart rental battery swap has entered more than 80 cities across the country, with a total of millions of registered users and tens of thousands of battery swap cabinets.
Zhiyan Consulting believes that electric two-wheeled vehicles are just needed derived from industries such as express delivery and instant delivery. With the development of the domestic shared motorcycle industry and the increasingly prominent battery life demand of the takeaway delivery industry, the electric two-wheeled vehicle battery swap industry will maintain rapid development. There are three main segments in the two-wheeled and three-wheeled vehicle market, the battery swapping cabinet market, the battery market and the operation market. In 2022, the market size of battery swapping cabinets in China's two-wheeled and three-wheeled vehicle battery swapping services will be 260 million yuan, the battery market size will be 2 billion yuan, and the operating market size will be 18.40 billion yuan.
Judging from the current situation, battery swap companies mainly develop the B-end market of electric two-wheeled vehicles, mainly to solve the electricity demand of instant delivery industries such as takeaway and express delivery. According to data from the China Business Industry Research Institute, in 2017, there were 3.957 million instant delivery workers in China, and in 2022, it will reach 11.205 million, with a compound annual growth rate of 23.1%. It is expected that the number of instant delivery workers will further increase to 12.101 million in 2023. The huge customer base is the confidence of the development of this industry.
However, there are no A-share listed companies on this track. According to Frost & Sullivan data, in the electric two-wheeler battery swap market, Yugu Technology is in the first echelon of the industry. This means that if it goes well, Yugu Technology will become the "first share of battery swap service".
There are also unfavorable factors in the industry, such as heavy assets and many complaints
Although the ambition to hit the "first share of battery swapping" is ambitious, the electric two-wheeler battery swap industry represented by Yugu Technology also has unfavorable factors such as too heavy assets, declining gross profits, user complaints and patent issues.
According to the prospectus, during the reporting period from 2020 to 2022 and from January to June 2023, the gross profit margin of Yugu Technology's battery swap business was 37.86%, 31.58%, 27.55% and 25.91% respectively, and the decline in the gross profit margin of the battery swap business also made the company's comprehensive gross profit margin continue to decline, with 44.58%, 33.82%, 28.54% and 26.58% respectively in the same period. For the decline in gross profit margin, Yugu Technology explained that the increase in the purchase price of raw material battery cells and the increase in costs caused by the advance investment of equipment.
At the same time, the battery swap mode is a heavy asset investment. The electric two-wheeled vehicle battery swap industry adopts a standardized lithium battery module + battery swap cabinet + mobile phone APP + remote data platform mode, and the investment cost of almost every link is not low. Taking this lithium battery swap as an example, there will only be more than 30,000 users in 2020, but at that time, they had spent more than 70 million yuan a year on the hardware of batteries and charging cabinets. Last year, Yugu Technology spent more than 100 million yuan on optoelectronics.
In addition, Yugu Technology also faces problems such as patent litigation and user complaints at the product level. According to the prospectus, on June 30, 2023, Hello filed a lawsuit against Yugu Technology in the Shanghai Intellectual Property Court, demanding that the company immediately stop infringing on the two utility model patents of "lithium battery and electric vehicle" (patent number ZL2019220213973) and "a battery detection device and battery" (patent number ZL201920891424X). This includes, but is not limited to, stopping the operation of the batteries involved in the implementation of the battery swapping cabinet and the battery monitoring system, and reserves the right to compensate Hello for the economic losses suffered by Hello in the course of the litigation.
In addition to the patent dispute, Yugu Technology's battery swap service has also been frequently complained by users. On the Black Cat complaint platform, there are 764 complaints related to "this lithium battery swap", and the reasons for user complaints are mainly focused on "the existence of overlord clauses", "no refunds", "short battery life", etc.
However, in the long run, the good news is not nothing: at present, except for groups such as delivery riders, other ordinary people have not joined the battery swap army. As of last year, according to the data of the China Bicycle Association, there were 350 million two-wheeled electric vehicles in the mainland, which may also be the confidence of Yugu Technology to sprint to "the first share of battery swap service".