Text | Financial Street Old Lee
A few years ago, the automotive industry has been saying: "China is a big country in the automobile industry, not a strong country", after experiencing the reform and reshaping of new energy vehicles in 2021, it can be said that today's China has achieved a leading position on the road of the world's automobile power.
What is the definition of an automotive powerhouse? Many people have their own answers, from the perspective of industrial competition strategy between countries, the automobile industry has three core elements - technology, supply chain and market, the first two are the most critical elements to determine the industrial power, in the new energy vehicle "curve overtaking" on the road, the competitiveness of the industry is not technology, because the technology itself is not much difference, the key difference is the supply chain.
On the fuel vehicle track, the domestic supply chain level has been lagging behind that of European and American countries, but in the new energy vehicle track, the domestic supply chain level has successively surpassed That of European and American countries. Today, Lao Li mainly shares with you from the perspective of supply chain, the three major changes in the supply chain system of new energy vehicles in 2021, namely, full localization, mesh ecology and specialization.
If you use a word to summarize the new energy vehicle supply chain in 2021, Lao Li feels that it is efficient, the comprehensive localization of the supply chain provides efficient supporting, logistics and control methods, the emergence of the industrial network will maximize the value of pan-tech enterprises, improve the utilization rate of social resources, and the emergence of specialized and new enterprises has revitalized the industrial network, new energy automobile enterprises in the network ecology, each performing its duties, bringing the industry into an "efficient era".
In the end, the supply chain is fully localized
In 2021, the first half of global electrification, Chinese companies played a triumphant song, in the core technology, supply chain and market areas, China has achieved and run or led, especially in the supply chain, creating the highest level in the history of China's automotive supply chain.
Comprehensive localization is the basic support for any industry to become bigger and stronger, from the cultivation of the Ningde era to the introduction of Tesla, China has been paying attention to the localization of the supply chain. In the past ten years, domestic enterprises have started from the core technologies of batteries, motors and electronic controls, and gradually formed the first-mover advantage of the industrial chain.
2021 is the supply chain of the fastest year of full localization, according to the statistics of the China Automobile Center, in 2021, China in the new energy vehicle Tier1 level, about 97% of the parts to achieve localization, and a year ago, this proportion is still 70%. Driven by technology and the market, some Chinese enterprises have achieved global leadership or parallel running in various segments, the core components of electrification have entered the era of self-supply, and leading enterprises such as The Ningde era have gone to sea to achieve local production.
In terms of the depth of the industrial chain, domestic enterprises have gradually established and improved the in-depth system of the industrial chain, and many head Tier1 have laid out the upstream of the industrial chain in a variety of ways such as self-research and investment. Taking the power battery as an example, from the battery package to the PACK to the monomer, from the positive and negative electrode materials to the precursor, from smelting to mineral deposits, every link of its industrial chain has the figure of Chinese enterprises and Chinese capital, which is of landmark significance.
In the industrial chain technology level, China step by step to lead and iterative development, after the high nickel ternary battery, Ningde times and other enterprises have been researching a series of new technologies such as semi-solid-state batteries, solid-state batteries, flat motor, third-generation semiconductors, lidar and other new parts have also appeared in China.
It can be said that the current localization degree, depth system and technical level of China's new energy vehicle electrification supply chain have reached the highest level in history, and more than half of these achievements have been accumulated in the past decade and pushed to the market in 2021.
In the process of global auto industry transformation, domestic auto companies have made remarkable achievements in the field of electrification by virtue of their first-mover advantage, but this is only the first half of the automotive revolution, and the second half is based on the high-tech intelligent and networked field, and Chinese enterprises are still in difficulty.
"Lack of core" has become "normalized" in 2021, exposing China's shortcomings in the semiconductor supply chain, whether it is basic semiconductors or high-end semiconductor companies, it is lackluster on the map of China's automotive industry chain, which is not only a problem in the automotive industry, but also a problem in the semiconductor industry. In fact, in addition to high-end semiconductors, China relies heavily on imported products in the fields of high-precision industrial sensors, basic industrial software, special raw materials, precision instrumentation and other fields, and the automobile industry is precisely the most widely used industry.
A healthy and prosperous industrial chain ecology is very important for the development of China's automobile industry, about the localization of the supply chain, the old Li team is like this: for the new parts that do not rely on basic science, the global pattern is basically Chinese and foreign and run or China leads, these parts and components have achieved localization, and the investment value has been basically excavated; and those who rely on the new parts of basic science, China is still catching up, especially the shortcomings in the field of intelligence and networking are very obvious, in turn, from the perspective of domestic production, This is a very important investment opportunity in the future.
According to the data of Tianyancha, in the past five years, the annual growth rate of the registration volume of chip-related enterprises in China has remained above 30%, and Lao Li believes that there will be new unicorns in these enterprises, just like the current horizon and black sesame. At the same time, in terms of on-board operating system and underlying technical solutions, domestic enterprises still have development opportunities, and the localization of these areas will be the most worthy of investment opportunities before the end of the intelligent electric vehicle industry.
From the supply chain to the industrial network
Last year, there was a very interesting phenomenon, when it comes to the development of the automotive supply chain, almost all industry leaders and experts are mentioning the concept of "mesh ecology", which represents the development trend of the automotive supply chain in the next decade.
The word mesh ecology originates from government documents, and in the "New Energy Vehicle Industry Development Plan (2021-2035)" issued by the State Council last year, it clearly put forward the blueprint for the future transformation of the automobile industry:
That is, with the comprehensive change of automobile power sources, production operation modes, and consumption and use patterns, the ecology of the new energy automobile industry is gradually evolving from the "chain relationship" between parts, vehicle research and development, production and marketing service enterprises into a "mesh ecology" in multiple fields such as automobiles, energy, transportation, information, and communications.
Lao Li mentioned this passage many times in his past articles, because from the perspective of top-level design, this passage is the highest program for the future development of the automobile industry. Around this program, the supply of new energy auto parts will also undergo tremendous changes - the future automotive "supply chain" will evolve into an automotive "industrial network".
Government planning has a more macro strategic consideration, in the context of the transformation of new and old kinetic energy, the automobile industry is a typical representative of the upgrading of traditional industries and the scale of emerging industries, after the formation of multi-industry "network ecology", through digitalization will be easy to build a new type of, industry-level digital ecology, open up the industry between, internal and external connections, with emerging industry technology to improve the efficiency of traditional industries, with the traditional industry market to drive the scale of emerging industries, to achieve 1 + 1>2 effect, thereby driving high-quality economic development.
Many friends feel very vain, but in fact, the trend of integration has emerged one by one in 2021:
The first trend is the Internet giant to build a car to integrate the new chain, in 2021, after accumulating two years of sound, Huawei began to fully enter the automotive industry with practical actions, first focusing on ICT, and then releasing the vehicle brand jointly built with Changan and Xiaokang; Baidu after announcing the car with Geely, readjusted the IDG business group, which marks that Baidu will fully integrate into the automotive industry with the model of vehicle + Internet software + Internet hardware; 360 invests in Nezha Automobile, and invests in intelligent, Carry out relevant layouts in the field of networking.
Cross-border integration is said a lot, but there are not many friends in the auto industry who really feel this trend, and everyone's focus is on the "main arteries" of Internet giants, and little attention is paid to the "capillaries" in the ecology of the automotive industry last year.
These "capillaries" represent the second trend - pan-tech companies began to explore integration into the automotive industry, compared to Huawei, Baidu and 360's thousands of dollars, many pan-tech companies into the automotive industry is much more difficult. Since last year, in terms of intelligent networking, enterprises in various segments such as information security, blockchain, cloud computing, big data, and algorithm services have begun to pour into the automobile industry, and in terms of smart energy, enterprises in subdivisions such as photovoltaics, energy storage, power grids, and energy management have also continued to appear, and many enterprises are unheard of.
In the field of information security alone, there are four leading players - Deep Belief, Qianxin, Venustech and Anheng Information, and the small players are countless. These enterprises give full play to the advantages of technology and products in their fields, intertwine with the traditional automotive industry chain into a new industrial chain, and then form an "industrial network", such as the application of information security technology to vehicle OTA, the encryption of Anheng information to the vehicle cloud platform, and so on.
At the morning meeting of many securities companies last year, automotive researchers, electric new researchers, electronic researchers, and computer researchers all talked about automobiles invariably, because the targets recommended by everyone are developing automobile business.
Although the blueprint of the "industrial network" has emerged in 2021, it is not easy to land. From the perspective of the development of the automobile industry, Chinese automobiles have experienced more than ten years of accumulation, and Chinese brands and foreign brands have formed an organic combination in terms of technology, industrial chain and market. At present, the integration of the five major areas of automobile, energy, transportation, communications and environment can be imagined, lao Li believes that it will take at least 5-10 years, fortunately, this curtain has been opened in 2021.
Covering all fields, Nuggets specialize in new ones
Many friends have found that the above-mentioned supply chain leads and runs, mainly concentrated in new energy vehicles, and the current domestic leadership is mainly concentrated in the industrial chain of electrification of new energy vehicles. However, from the top level of the "industrial network", in the future, domestic enterprises still need to hit more points, establish more leading and running supply chains, and lead the industry to achieve this goal is often small and medium-sized enterprises.
Lao Li visited a lot of small enterprises in the automotive industry chain at the beginning of last year, especially in the first half of the year in the market to re-promote leading enterprises, many small and medium-sized listed companies are extremely anxious, in addition to these listed companies, there are a large number of unlisted enterprises in The country is also seeking development, we need to face two problems, one is in the development of the industry, the establishment of enterprise moats, the other is to find suitable capital soil, cultivate enterprises.
In the current market situation, a company focusing on the key nodes of the industrial network is the most important basis for winning industry and market recognition, these nodes have a high technical threshold, but the market is not large, leading enterprises are not willing to do, only small and medium-sized enterprises can charge into the front, so it should be the most appropriate to use "specialized and new" to describe such enterprises.
As the name suggests, specialized and special new smes refer to small and medium-sized enterprises with four characteristics: specialization, refinement, specialization and novelty. Therefore, the 14th Five-Year Plan proposes to promote small and medium-sized enterprises to enhance their professional advantages and cultivate specialized new small giant enterprises and manufacturing single champion enterprises.
In the first batch of 81 companies listed on the Beijing Stock Exchange, there are 14 companies in the automotive industry, accounting for nearly 20%, and the 14 companies include 8 auto parts manufacturers, 3 special vehicle manufacturers, as well as auto sellers, auto parts sellers and auto battery material manufacturers.
Old Li communicated with friends some time ago, for the automobile industry, there are two concepts of "specialization and special newness", one is the definition proposed by the government, the definition of different provinces is slightly different, and the other is the industrial concept, that is, the "specialization and special new" technology. For example, Beiterui, which is listed on the Beijing Stock Exchange, although the enterprise is not large, has always been a well-known domestic power battery material enterprise, and its core customers not only include domestic battery companies such as Ningde, but also include foreign-funded enterprises such as LG and Samsung, relying on core technologies and scarce resources to achieve the external output of products.
Under the industrial concept, there are many examples of "specialized and new" enterprises in the automotive industry, such as Wanji Technology, which soared in the market value of the ETC concept in the previous two years, and last year, because of the EDR policy, the market value of enterprises represented by Qiming Information soared. Compared with ETC, the technical threshold of EDR is higher, the market is larger, the domestic ETC market is only more than 10 billion, and the EDR market is 100 billion.
If EDR is driven by policy-driven development, then the enterprise represented by electric connection technology is completely market-driven development, the development of new energy vehicles has driven the use of micro electrical connectors and related interconnection systems, and the micro radio frequency connector independently developed by electric connection technology has reached the international first-class level, and the products are widely used in intelligent mobile terminal products represented by smart phones and emerging products such as internet of vehicles, smart home appliances, etc. Since last year, there are many similar enterprises in the new energy vehicle supply chain.
In 2022, under the guidance of comprehensive localization, mesh ecology and specialization, China's auto industry will further exert the advantages of the "efficient era", the core enterprises of the automotive supply chain will rely on the efficient system on the basis of good fundamentals, establish a more perfect supporting relationship, many financial indicators will have greater improvement, and China's new energy automobile industry chain will move from "quantitative change" to "qualitative change".