In September last year, Geely Holdings announced the signing of a cooperation agreement with Tianqi Lithium Industry, which will invest 1.
1 billion yuan in the smart brand, and the cooperation will be more than financial investment.
According to the agreement, the two sides plan to use the upstream and downstream advantages of the new energy industry chain to maximize industrial synergy.
Tianqi Lithium Industry is the “Lithium King” of China, and together with Ganfeng Lithium Industry, it is known as “Lithium Mine Shuangxiong”.
Investment in smart can be seen, “Lithium King” ambition, has officially entered the car-building link, and focus on the entire automobile industry chain.
Lithium mining giants have a keen sense of smell.
Before that, the figure of Ganfeng lithium industry also appeared in the cooperation or financing list of GAC Ean and Lantu Automobile.
Like Tianqi lithium industry, the company also hopes to be more deeply bound with the car-building link to improve the efficiency of the industrial chain.
Before 2023, the lithium mining giants experienced a very glorious day, with rich and powerful resources around the world, and made a lot of money in the new energy industry.
But from this year, the former Lithium King scenery no longer, Tianqi Lithium Industry and Ganfeng Lithium Industry, once a pair of “rich brothers”, also ushered in the most difficult loss storm.
Take Tianqi Lithium Industry as an example.
In April this year, the second generation Jiang Anqi took over the basic industry of her father Jiang Weiping and officially became the chairman of Tianqi Lithium Industry.
At that time, Tianqi Lithium Industry was the “Lithium King” with a market capitalization of 70 billion yuan.
Jiang Anqi was born in 1987.
After completing the relay in charge, she also became one of the rare “post-85” women.
Like Fu Li, the female master of Wa, Yang Huiyan of country Garden, and Ding Jiamin of Special step, every move attracted a lot of attention when she came to the front stage from behind the scenes.
However, Jiang Anqi may not have expected that in less than half a year as the new chairman, she and the company ushered in the most difficult trough.
According to the semi-annual report of Tianqi lithium industry, the cumulative revenue from January to June this year was about 64.
2 billion yuan, down 74 percent from the same period last year, with a net loss of 5.
2 billion yuan, compared with a profit of 6.
45 billion yuan in the same period last year.
The storm has come, and this year’s crisis is a test for Jiang Anqi.
It lost more than 5 billion yuan in half a year, which is the largest loss in the company’s history for the same period.
Since Tianqi Lithium went public in 2010, it experienced an annual loss in 2013, but the loss at that time was only 130 million yuan.
In the first half of 2020, the company ushered in its first interim loss of 697 million yuan.
It can be seen that the losses in the first half of this year, both in terms of amount and negative impact, are far higher than in the past.
On the other hand, Ganfeng Lithium Industry has also experienced the first loss since its listing, and the wealth of Chairman Li Liangbin has also been reduced by a full 50 billion yuan compared with its peak.
Data show that in the first half of this year, Ganfeng lithium industry’s revenue totaled 9.
59 billion yuan, down 47% from the same period last year, while the loss was 760 million yuan, down 113% from the same period last year.
As early as 2022, Tianqi Lithium Industry still had a profit of 24.
1 billion yuan, while Ganfeng Lithium Industry made a net profit of 20.
5 billion yuan.
In this highly cyclical industry, the former two men of lithium industry are now in the same predicament.
With operating losses, coupled with falling stock prices and market capitalization collapse, Jiang Anqi has inherited her father’s business and is under great challenge and pressure.
so far, the market capitalization of Tianqi lithium industry has shrunk by nearly 200 billion from its peak.
In addition to the company’s operations and important decisions, she also has to face problems such as fluctuations in the price of lithium products and the decline in the performance of the associated company SQM (Chile).
Challenge one is the performance tentacles of more yuan.
For a long time in the past, the performance of Tianqi Lithium Industry was highly dependent on fluctuations in lithium prices.
In the industry, the rise and fall of lithium prices continue to reshape the competition pattern of the subdivision track, and the diversified layout of the industrial chain can change the performance that is highly dependent on the changes of lithium prices and the limitations of the industrial cycle.
After 2023, lithium carbonate suffered the worst decline in history, and in 2024, the price of lithium carbonate futures stirred up the pessimistic market frequently.
In August this year, the price of battery-grade lithium carbonate fell to an all-time low of 80,000 yuan per ton.
The second challenge is the issue of investment and acquisition left over by history.
The performance of Tianqi lithium industry, in addition to the impact of the lower price of lithium carbonate, there is another hidden danger, that is, frequent overseas acquisition and investment in previous years.
For example, the associated company SQM (Chile), Tianqi Lithium Industry has been saddled with debt for four years to win this company, but SQM has recently been involved in lawsuits and declining performance, which makes Tianqi Lithium Industry very difficult.
Ganfeng Lithium Industry also ushered in a “young owner” this year.
Li Liangbin promoted his son Li Chenglin to Ganfeng Lithium Industry Vice President, who was born in 1996.
“Lithium II” may take over his father and perform a script like Jiang Anqi in the future.
However, as chairman of the board, Li Liangbin has repeatedly conveyed his anxiety about the future in the company.
he even said bluntly that the issue of resources is like a knife hanging over the company’s head, and when it falls, it will be the end of the enterprise– “this round of competition.
” we can’t slow down, in that case, the company will miss the most important development opportunity.
” As the successor of Li Chenglin, walking at the most critical crossroads of the company, it is difficult to say that it is easy at this stage.
Solid-state battery is the next stop, but at the work report meeting at the beginning of this year, Li Liangbin clearly put forward the focus of development in the next few years, taking into account the growing demand for electric vehicle batteries and energy storage batteries.
Ganfeng Lithium Industry will adhere to the direction of solid-state battery and power battery recycling in the short term, and seek new business blue sea.
Tianqi Lithium Industry said at the semi-annual report results conference that from the point of view of the future demand growth of the lithium industry, the most important direction is the breakthrough of new battery technology.
Especially the technological progress of metal lithium anode materials will increase the demand for lithium raw materials.
on the other hand, solid-state batteries will break the ceiling of energy density of lithium batteries and become a new trend to improve the performance of lithium batteries.
The layout of Tianqi lithium industry is very fast.
In terms of solid-state batteries, the company is currently involved mainly through investment and equity participation.
Chengdu Tianqi holds about 3 per cent of Beijing Weilan New Energy and Tianqi Lithium Hong Kong holds about 7.
97 per cent of SES AI Corporation to track and observe the industry’s cutting-edge technology and commercialization.
In addition, Tianqi Lithium, a wholly owned subsidiary of Tianqi Lithium Industry, has jointly funded a joint venture with Beijing Weilan New Energy-Tianqi Weilan solid Lithium New Materials (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. At present, the company’s pre-lithiation laboratory construction project has been completed and accepted, and completed two sets of negative pre-lithiation equipment process development.
At the performance communication meeting, the company said that it had led to the first sale of lithium sulphide products for the next generation of solid-state batteries.
Last year, Ganfeng Lithium Industry and Chang’anAutomobile announced that the two signed a “Memorandum of Cooperation”, which will accelerate the industrialization of (semi-) solid state battery technology and promote the expansion of upstream lithium mineral resources, deep processing of lithium salts, battery materials, midstream battery manufacturing and downstream waste batteries.
Extended cooperation in utilization.
A spokesperson for the board of directors of Ganfeng Lithium Industry said at this year’s investor communication meeting that the company’s first-generation semi-solid-state batteries have been trial-installed in a small number of models, and is currently actively discussing the possibility of further mass production with downstream car companies.
The second-generation semi-solid-state battery is under development.
It is reported that the energy density of the cell can be more than 400Wh/Kg, can pass the needle needle punch test, has high output power, and continues to discharge above 5C.
It is worth mentioning that the Timeline is pushed forward.
As early as 2022, Ganfeng Lithium’s solid-state batteries have already been put into mass production on the Dongfeng E70.
This is also the first batch of new energy vehicles equipped with solid-state batteries in the world.
Times have changed and the direction has also changed.
In the early years,”lithium kings” like Tianqi Lithium were the giants of the global lithium industry that grew up through mergers and acquisitions.
Jiang Weiping spent 4 billion yuan to acquire lithium ore giant Teleson in 2012, and spent huge sums of money to acquire equity in SQM in 2016, making the company become a global lithium giant in large-scale mergers and acquisitions.
But it is also these huge mergers and acquisitions that put the company under excessive debt pressure.
Coupled with the cyclical low lithium prices in the past two years, the “lithium kings” have become more and more pragmatic.
Horizontal acquisitions are no longer suitable for the new business growth curve.
Only by breaking through from new incisions can we stabilize our position.
Technological innovation is undoubtedly one of the new breakthroughs.
Huge changes in financial conditions and a serious drop in stock prices have forced the former “Lithium King” to accelerate reforms.
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