The lithium battery diaphragm market is mixed

my country Energy Storage Network News: After the bloody price war in 2018, the diaphragm industry ushered in a moment of stability and joy in 2019, but with it, further decline in prices and intensified competition escalated. The side of the coin is that the diaphragm giant’s orders are getting good news frequently, and the price is temporarily stable. From January to May, Xingyuan Materials successively signed supply agreements or business cooperation agreements with Funeng Technology, Hefei Guoxuan, BAK Power, and Yiwei Lithium Energy; Enjie also won a five-year supply of LG Chem one. At the same time, news from the leading shipping channels of the diaphragm shows that after the fierce price war last year, although it is not ruled out that the price will fall further in the later period, the current diaphragm price is temporarily stable. From the perspective of order supply, on the one hand, the globalization process of domestic diaphragm companies is accelerating. Due to the fear of insufficient high-end production supply, international battery companies prefer to cooperate with long-term orders. The technological advantages, output advantages and cost-effective advantages of domestic leading diaphragm companies are further highlighted. On the other hand, the import substitution of domestic diaphragms is also accelerating. Under the dual use of subsidizing the retreat power lithium-ion battery company to strictly control the cost of the supply chain and the rise of domestic diaphragm technology, the power lithium-ion battery company that used imported diaphragms was previously important. The domestic diaphragm has been gradually replaced. In fact, the large orders obtained by the diaphragm giants are a concrete reflection of the rapid expansion of demand-side production. At present, international head-power lithium-ion battery companies including CATL, Panasonic, LG, SDI, and SKI have all announced or have implemented expansion plans. According to the preliminary statistics of Gaogong Lithium Battery, the total output plan of the first three battery companies mentioned above is as high as 160GWh by 2025. According to the calculation that the 1GWh power lithium-ion battery requires approximately 20 million square meters of separators, the three battery companies will require 3.2 billion square meters of separators. On the other side of the coin, competition in the diaphragm industry is still intensifying. First, the expansion of production is closer to the leading companies, which means that the industry concentration will be further improved; second, the subsidy has declined sharply, based on the comprehensive consideration of price and performance, the dry process diaphragm has begun to counter the market, and the dry and wet process may be upgraded; The rapid release of output and the downstream cost reduction transmission will further reduce the price of diaphragms. Production expansion continues. Accompanied by the explosive growth of demand-side production layout, the production expansion of Diaphragm Company is also accelerating. Gaogong Lithium combed through the production expansion information of the diaphragm company from January to May and found that the expansion of diaphragm production was dominated by giants, and the production release was dominated by wet diaphragms. At the same time, the competition in the diaphragm industry has gradually escalated from price disputes between domestic companies to a competition with international diaphragm companies in terms of quality, output, and cost-effectiveness. Dry-process diaphragms accelerate the market counterattack. The new subsidy policy boots are launched in 2019. The 'half-cut' type of decline and increased emphasis on product safety performance have forced the new energy vehicle and power lithium-ion battery industry chain to return to market-oriented thinking. As a result, the low-cost, excellent performance, and thinner dry-process diaphragm began to usher in the market 'counterattack.' Gaogong Lithium learned that this year's head power lithium-ion battery company's demand for diaphragms in the segmented product field has begun to shift from wet to dry. The large-scale application of 18μm and 16μm power dry single-pull diaphragms is already on the way. Objectively speaking, based on the consideration of cost reduction and the slowing down of the pursuit of a single target for high-energy density batteries, it is a general trend for the dry-process diaphragm to grab a certain share of the wet-process diaphragm. The price will still fall further. Although the market demand is huge, in recent years, with the continuous release of production and the continuous improvement of technology, the price of the diaphragm has been declining. This year, the average price of some low-end dry-method single-pull base membranes has fallen below 1 yuan/square meter, and the quotation of some wet-method membrane base membranes has also fallen to about 1.5 yuan/square meter. The consensus in the industry is that this year's mainstream diaphragm prices still have room for further decline, and the core of the future diaphragm competition must be the overall strength of production control and production line cost control.