With the proposal of the national "double carbon strategy", clean energy industries such as photovoltaic and hydrogen energy have attracted the attention of the capital market. In recent years, in addition to traditional photovoltaic solar energy enterprises such as Longji Green Energy, distribution enterprises such as TBEA and Zhengtai Electrical Appliances. Household appliances enterprises such as Skyworth, TCL, Gree and Mei have also intervened in the upstream and downstream photovoltaic industry chain by means of independent technology layout or investment holding, and even recently Huawei's new energy company has announced the launch of new products and solutions for three major photovoltaic application scenarios, namely, industry and commerce, power stations and household use. Photovoltaic industry has become a hot new outlet and new track in the market.
Household appliances enterprises actively enter the photovoltaic industry
in the photovoltaic field, household appliances enterprises are an important force, but in terms of layout direction, the focus of each enterprise is not exactly the same.
Taking TCL Technology as an example, in 2020, the company purchased Zhonghuan shares (now known as "TCL Zhonghuan") at a price of 10.974 billion yuan. In that year, Zhonghuan shares realized revenue of 19.06 billion yuan and net profit of 1.09 billion yuan. By 2022, TCL Central reported revenue of 67 billion 10 million yuan, and realized net profit of 6 billion 819 million yuan in the same period. TCL Central mainly focuses on the upstream layout of photovoltaic wafers, photovoltaic cells and components, and in recent years, the company has also begun to expand to photovoltaic power generation and other fields with strong relevance. In 2022, TCL Central's photovoltaic wafer and photovoltaic module business achieved a total revenue of 61.741 billion yuan, accounting for about 90% of the total revenue, while the photovoltaic power plant business achieved a revenue of 619 million yuan. Seizing the opportunity of the development of the domestic photovoltaic industry, the domestic sales of TCL Zhonghuan in 2022 increased by 71% year-on-year, reaching 58.183 billion yuan, while the export business also increased by 24%, achieving an export volume of 8.826 billion yuan.
Compared with the upstream layout of TCL Central Ring, Skyworth is more focused on the terminal area of photovoltaic business, especially household photovoltaic power plants. According to the financial report of Skyworth Group in 2022, the company's total installed capacity of distributed photovoltaic power stations has leaped to the first camp in the industry, with more than 140000 new household photovoltaic power stations in operation and grid-connected power generation, and more than 200000 household photovoltaic power stations built and operated. Photovoltaic business has become the "second growth curve" to boost the group's performance. In 2022, Skyworth Group achieved a total revenue of 53.491 billion yuan, while the photovoltaic business contributed 11.934 billion yuan, compared with 104 million yuan in 2020.
In addition, such as the United States through the holding of Hekang Xinneng, Gree Electric also participated in the photovoltaic field through the research and development of photovoltaic air conditioning. On June 22, Hekang Xinneng issued a plan announcement to issue A-share stocks to specific targets, which said that the target of this stock issuance is Midea Group, the indirect controlling shareholder of the company, and the Midea Group will subscribe for all the shares issued by the company in cash at a price of 443 yuan per share, and eventually raise 1.473 billion yuan. There are four main purposes for Hekang Xinneng to raise funds, one is to upgrade the business capability of electrical equipment, the other is to build a photovoltaic industry platform, and the third is to upgrade the information system of enterprises and supplement liquidity. What is the reason for
the spin-off?
In the process of photovoltaic layout of household appliances enterprises, an interesting phenomenon is that the parent company seems to be more willing to carry out the layout of this field by holding rather than directly intervening in the operation. Of course, this may be due to the fact that household appliances enterprises are facing an unfamiliar industry and need to be managed by a management team that knows more about photovoltaic. But at the same time, it is undeniable that the parent company also has the idea of sharing risks by means of holding rather than direct operation, such as Skyworth and Zhengtai Electric Appliances, which are currently considering splitting the photovoltaic business.
Some industry analysts told China State Grid that the spin-off business listing, on the one hand, will help the parent company to leverage more social resources with less resources, such as absorbing other shareholders, borrowing from banks or financial institutions, to help the holding subsidiary grow by leaps and bounds. Once the subsidiary company is faced with major uncertainties in its operation and other shareholders share the risks, the parent company can minimize the losses. Although the
photovoltaic industry has broad long-term prospects, it also has a series of problems, such as short-term market volatility, obvious industry cycle, relative overcapacity and difficulty in promoting end-users, which are easy to impact the capital chain of individual enterprises.
Taking the upstream photovoltaic industry as an example, according to the data released by InfoLink Consulting, a data consulting company, by the end of 2022, the effective capacity of polysilicon, silicon wafers, batteries and components in the world has reached more than 500 GW. The photovoltaic industry is still expanding its production. Taking Tongwei Co., Ltd., a leading enterprise in silicon materials, as an example, the company plans to raise 10.5 billion yuan to expand the production of solar cells and modules. Longji Green Energy, a leading photovoltaic module company, has recently announced that it plans to raise 20 billion yuan overseas to expand domestic production capacity and build factories overseas. It is expected that by the end of 2023, the total production capacity of photovoltaic materials and modules in the world will exceed 800GW, while the global installed capacity target in 2023 is only 350 GW ~ 400 GW, and the industry is facing a phased surplus. Since the second half of 2022, the expectation of price reduction has begun to be transmitted in the photovoltaic industry chain. The price of photovoltaic polysilicon and photovoltaic modules in the market has been reduced in an all-round way. According to relevant media reports, since the beginning of 2023, the price of polysilicon has fallen by about 60%, while the price of modules has fallen by about 20%, and the industry still has room for downward adjustment. Li Zhenguo, founder of Longji Green Energy, even predicted that the periodic surplus of photovoltaic industry may occur at any time, and even more than half of the enterprises may be eliminated in the next two or three years. There are also many problems
in the field of photovoltaic installation terminals, especially in the field of household photovoltaic power plants laid out by enterprises. In 2022, titanium media exposed the so-called "photovoltaic leasing fraud", that is, financial companies pay for the purchase of photovoltaic equipment from manufacturers, farmers lease the equipment of financial companies to install on their own roofs, the income from power generation is used to repay the cost of equipment leasing, and the income from power generation is owned by farmers after the contract expires. This kind of contract is generally under the banner of "free", but eventually the risk of equipment damage after photovoltaic installation is transferred to the farmers who sign the lease contract. Previously, Phoenix also exposed sales routines such as "photovoltaic loans", that is, manufacturers and financial institutions use farmers'information loans in the name of free photovoltaic installation by taking advantage of loopholes such as farmers' non-credit checks. These routine sales have caused many photovoltaic disputes, triggered a lot of negative public opinion, and also laid hidden dangers for the healthy development of household photovoltaic industry.
However, on the whole, in the context of the fossil energy crisis, global climate governance and the urgent need for energy shortage and security, accelerating the transformation of energy structure to renewable energy has become a global issue, and more than 130 countries and regions in the world have accepted the Kigali Agreement. Put forward "zero carbon emissions" and "carbon neutral" climate goals.
In this context, the photovoltaic industry has been improving for a long time. Taking Midea Group as an example, at present, its 20 factories and R & D innovation centers have built photovoltaic power generation projects, with the average proportion of clean energy use in Midea Group reaching more than 10% by 2021, and they have also set a target of 30% of green power in the whole group by 2030. Another example is Panasonic, who put forward a medium- and long-term environmental vision in April 2022, that is, by 2030, all Panasonic factories in the world will achieve substantial zero carbon emissions, and by 2050, they will substantially reduce carbon emissions by 310 million tons. In this process, Panasonic manufacturing plants have applied a large number of "green power" means such as solar energy and power trough energy storage. In 2022, Apple launched an initiative calling on its global supply chain companies to take action to address their greenhouse gas emissions and fully decarbonize, including 100% renewable energy power supply. Some industry analysts believe that for Chinese "fruit chain" suppliers who rely heavily on Apple, whether they like it or not, they must achieve zero carbon emissions in their factories by 2030, otherwise they may be kicked out of the "fruit chain". Independent embrace or forced transformation, the transformation to clean energy such as photovoltaic is on the line.
At present, in addition to China, countries and regions including Europe and the United States, Japan and South Korea, India, Brazil and Australia are strongly supporting the development of photovoltaic industry, while the United States, Europe and India have also put forward ambitious photovoltaic local manufacturing initiatives, which to some extent may increase the possibility of setting up photovoltaic trade barriers in these countries and regions. How to coordinate the contradiction between long-term interests and short-term interests of photovoltaic enterprises will test the wisdom of the helmsman.
浙公网安备33010802003254号