Aluminum plastic film to open the process of localization

In recent years, with the continuous growth of the market demand for soft-pack batteries, domestic aluminum-plastic film companies that have not yet achieved large-scale supply have ushered in new development opportunities. The industry's leading enterprises Zijiang Enterprises (600210.SH) and Buddha Plastic Technology (000973.SZ) gradually opened the process of domestic aluminum plastic film to replace imports.
 
In the context of China's lithium battery other materials have basically achieved localization, aluminum plastic film as the final realization of localization of lithium battery materials has also become a hot spot in the current market competition.
 
"At present, the global aluminum plastic film market is basically monopolized by a few companies such as Japan's DNP and Showa." Luo Huanta, head of the Gaogong Lithium Industry Research Institute (GBII), believes that although China's aluminum-plastic film companies are not enough to shake the status of Japan's DNP, Showa and other industry giants at this stage, with the addition of Chinese companies, aluminum-plastic film The price will gradually decline, and technical barriers will gradually be broken.
 
Opportunity
In a broad sense, aluminum-plastic film is a packaging material for soft-pack batteries. This material has become an indispensable packaging material for soft-pack batteries because it meets the demanding requirements of soft-pack batteries in terms of shape and volume.
 
In fact, aluminum plastic film is valued, thanks to the rapid rise of the soft pack battery market.
 
According to GBII statistics, China's soft-pack lithium battery market reached 10.8 billion yuan in 2013, an increase of 27% over 2 0 1 2. From 2009 to 2013, the scale of China's soft package lithium battery market showed a rapid growth trend, mainly driven by the rapid growth of emerging electronic product markets such as smart phones and tablet computers at home and abroad.
 
The advent of the era of smart phones has completely changed the pattern of the domestic lithium battery industry. In the transition period of smart phones instead of functional phones, the growth rate of soft pack batteries is more obvious.
 
2 0 1 1 is a watershed in the domestic mobile phone industry. From the beginning of 2011, the smart phone market began to grow, and quickly seize the market share of the cottage mobile phone. According to survey data, domestic smartphone sales reached 73.44 million units in 2011, up 129.4 per cent year-on-year.
 
With the further impact of smartphones on the market share of traditional feature phones (including copycats), most battery manufacturers, including BYD, Tianjin Lishen and Bangkai, began to see a decline in shipments of aluminum shells from 2001. In addition, after years of industry price wars, the gross profit margin of aluminum-shell lithium batteries has been very low, and the gross profit margin of most battery manufacturers in this field is generally as low as below 10%. In this context, the original aluminum shell battery companies have begun to transform to soft pack batteries.
 
According to incomplete statistics of GBII, from 2009 to 2013, the number of newly registered soft-pack lithium battery enterprises or entrepreneurs who transformed into soft-pack lithium battery production reached 86, while there were only 74 mass-produced enterprises before.
 
Judging from the entry time, 13 new ones entered in 2009, 21 new ones in 2010, 32 new ones in 2011, 20 new ones in 2012 and 45 new ones in 2013.
 
A large number of new enterprises have greatly driven the growth of China's soft pack battery market. In 2011, the market size of China's soft pack lithium battery reached 6.1 billion yuan. By 2013, the market size of soft pack battery increased by 1.7 times, becoming the lithium battery variety with the fastest growth in the market size in the past two years.
 
It is worth noting that, driven by the rapid development of the soft package market, China's aluminum plastic film application market has also begun to grow rapidly.
 
According to GBII survey statistics, the demand for aluminum-plastic film for lithium batteries in China was 36.5 million square meters in 2013, an increase of 40% year-on-year; the market size was 1.5 billion yuan, an increase of 30% year-on-year.
 
"The rapid rise of the soft pack battery market provides an opportunity for domestic aluminum plastic film to break out of the siege." A domestic aluminum-plastic film agent believes that before 2012, domestic agents basically only act as agents for Japanese products. Starting from 2012, a few agents began to act as agents for domestic aluminum-plastic film products such as Fosu Technology.
 
Rise
China's aluminum-plastic film enterprises in the soft package battery market under the stimulus of the rapid growth, and gradually opened the process of localization of aluminum-plastic film.
 
"The aluminum-plastic film project of Fosu Technology started as early as 2008, completed breakthroughs in product structure design and key performance from 2009 to early 2011, began trial production and sample delivery evaluation in 2012, and began to enter the market in small batches in 2013." Xu Bing, head of the aluminum-plastic film project for the lithium battery of Fosu Technology, said in an interview with "High-tech Lithium Battery" that because he was optimistic about the future development prospects of the soft-pack battery market, the company began to lay out the key material for soft-pack batteries as early as six years ago-the field of aluminum-plastic film.
 
As the leader of the domestic packaging and printing industry, Zijiang Enterprise has long been involved in the aluminum-plastic film business through its shareholding company Shanghai Zijiang Color Printing Packaging Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Zijiang Color Printing").
 
He Aizhong, deputy general manager of Shanghai Zijiang New Material Technology Co., Ltd., told reporters that Shanghai Zijiang Color Printing Packaging Co., Ltd. has been setting up a project to develop aluminum-plastic film for lithium batteries since 2004. In 2012, Zijiang Enterprise Group began to separate the aluminum-plastic film project from Zijiang Color Printing and specially prepare for the establishment of Shanghai Zijiang New Material Technology Co., Ltd.
 
Although all along, the domestic aluminum plastic film market has been occupied by Japan's DNP, Showa two giants. However, with Zijiang enterprises and Buddha plastic technology gradually began to increase in the market, from 2014, domestic aluminum plastic film gradually began to be recognized by some domestic battery core enterprises, and the localization process of aluminum plastic film is also accelerating.
 
One of the most significant changes is the obvious rise of related stocks, Zijiang enterprises, Buddha plastic technology recent stock prices rose, aluminum plastic film localization began to stir the wind and cloud in the secondary market.
 
The reporter noticed that behind the sharp rise in lithium battery concept stocks, the aluminum-plastic film sector in the subdivision field is more likely to be popular in the secondary market in the near future. Zijiang Enterprise, a listed company represented by the aluminum-plastic film field, has reached the limit three times in five trading days in early September, with an increase of 62.5 in 14 trading days. Another concept stock, Fosu Technology, has also performed well recently, with the largest increase of more than 12.35 per cent in the last three trading days.
 
"Judging from the reaction of the secondary market, aluminum-plastic film is easier to attract the attention of hot money because it has the concept of replacing imports." China Merchants Securities analyst Wang Jianwei believes that although domestic aluminum-plastic film is currently unable to replace the dominant position of imports, but with price advantages and localization strategies, domestic aluminum-plastic film has a lot of room for substitution.
 
On the other hand, the lack of nationalization share of aluminum-plastic film also means that there will be a huge domestic alternative space in this field in the future. Zijiang Enterprise mentioned in its 2013 annual report that the aluminum-plastic film for lithium-ion batteries with independent intellectual property rights developed by the company has passed the certification of some large domestic lithium battery manufacturers, which is expected to break the monopoly of Japanese companies. "Zijiang aluminum plastic film has formed a relatively complete product line." He Aizhong told Gao Gong Li Dian that Zijiang has already introduced A88 and B113 products suitable for consumer electronics and small power fields, C152 and D123 products suitable for electric vehicle power fields, and special black aluminum-plastic films in consumer electronics fields are in the later stage of research and development.
 
Similar to Zijiang enterprises, Buddha plastic technology has also accelerated the pace of aluminum plastic film market promotion. Xu Bing, chief manager of the aluminum-plastic film project of Fosu Technology, told reporters: "In less than a year, Fosu Technology's aluminum-plastic film has been delivered to more than 100 customers, and most of the trial battery factories are entering the packaging and use stage of batch batteries."
 
GBII analyst Gao Xiaobing believes that at present, there is no domestic aluminum-plastic film enterprises to achieve large-scale shipments, Zijiang enterprises, Buddha plastic technology and other gradual release will become the starting point to replace imports, the future import substitution space is huge. In addition, in recent years, the market share of polymer lithium batteries has continued to expand, and aluminum-plastic films are expected to show demand expansion and import substitution in the future.
 
Bottleneck
In fact, aluminum-plastic film, as the packaging material of soft-packed lithium battery, is a relatively high technical difficulty in the field of lithium battery materials, far exceeding the diaphragm, positive electrode, negative electrode and electrolyte, because the relevant technical bottlenecks have yet to be broken through. The global aluminum-plastic film material market has been controlled by a few enterprises such as Japan.
 
"As far as aluminum-plastic film is concerned, it is currently concentrated in only a few companies. Japan's D N P and Showa two companies have a global market share of about 85%, which used to be more than 90%, and these two companies are in China. The market share is about 90%."
 
Luo Huanta, head of GBII, believes that there are few domestic production enterprises at present. Compared with foreign products, domestic products in the process stability and stamping resistance is still slightly insufficient.
 
According to GBII survey statistics, China's aluminum-plastic film market is dominated by Japan, with a total of 8 imported aluminum-plastic film brands and 7 in Japan. There is also a South Korean Li Village Chemical.
 
Technical bottleneck has become the biggest obstacle restricting domestic aluminum-plastic film enterprises to speed up localization.
 
"Due to the huge investment and the difficulty of the project, the research results of domestic enterprises are not many, and they are almost at a standstill. The achievements and experience obtained are limited to the outer and middle parts, and the inner materials of the core have not been completely overcome." The person in charge of a battery cell factory that has tried domestic aluminum-plastic film told reporters that there is still a big gap between the performance of domestic aluminum-plastic film products and imports, so most domestic manufacturers are still in the small batch trial stage and dare not purchase on a large scale.
 
From the process point of view, there are two kinds of aluminum-plastic film, the dry aluminum-plastic film represented by Showa Electric and the thermal aluminum-plastic film represented by DNP, both of which have their own advantages and disadvantages. The dry process is formed by direct pressure bonding between AL and CPP after bonding with adhesive. The thermal process uses ND between AL and CPP to slowly heat up and raise the temperature.
 
Relevant research data show that the advantages of dry method are good deep drawing performance, excellent short circuit resistance and good appearance. At the same time, the production process is simple and the cost is low. The disadvantage is that the electrolyte resistance and water resistance are not as good as the thermal method. The advantage of thermal method lies in excellent electrolyte resistance and water resistance, but the disadvantage is poor deep drawing performance and complicated process.
 
According to GBII statistics, as of May 2014, China's domestic aluminum-plastic film has achieved mass production. Three of them are Shanghai Zijiang, Zhongjin Matai and Fosu Technology. At present, all three have developed aluminum-plastic film production technology and have applied for relevant patents. Their products have also been put on the market, but the recognition of domestic aluminum-plastic film by lithium battery manufacturers is not very high, and the manufacturers that use them are also small batches.
 
"At present, the domestic research progress of aluminum plastic film is more in the application of aluminum plastic film improvement."
 
GBII analyst Li Zhenqiang believes that the domestic mainly by improving the sealing of aluminum-plastic film and improving the delamination of aluminum-plastic film to improve the performance of aluminum-plastic film.
 
"Although the core technologies of special aluminum foil, HF-resistant adhesive and modified PP materials are still monopolized by foreign countries, with the continuous investment in research and development of domestic enterprises, and battery core enterprises will choose some enterprises to cooperate in the development of aluminum-plastic films under the pressure of cost competition, these will become positive factors for the localization of aluminum-plastic films."
 
Luo Huanta believes that the aluminum-plastic film products of Fosu Technology and Zijiang Enterprises have already obtained orders from some lithium battery manufacturers, but it will take some time to accumulate to break Japan's technological monopoly.